Have you been wondering what happened to Mark Karpeles? Remember Mt Gox and its notorious collapse? Well as it turns out, the CEO of the company could be worth north of BTC 200,000 ($1.43 billion, yes billion with a ‘b’!). Or at least the company that is in control of the remaining quarter of the assets of the exchange is worth this much.
The CEO of the exchange, Mark Karpeles, is controlling the firm and while court proceedings against him are ongoing, the claims of the victims of the exchange are calculated in Japanese yen. Not only has Bitcoin risen about 17 times since then, but the Japanese yen has depreciated versus the US dollar by 11 percent.
The double whammy for claimants in the case against Mt Gox exposes key flaws in the legal system that is in place around the globe. The company that Mark Karpeles controls is said to be able to repay its victims in full after it recovered a quarter of client deposits. While the CEO claims that the unfortunate loss of clients of the exchange is a result of a hacker attack, claimants allege that the incident was a well-devised scheme.
Prosecutors claim that Karpeles spent close to $3 million of client money for his personal needs.
Court Filings Point fo Millions of Dollars of Excess
If Bitcoin prices remain where they are, even after the company is to repay Japanese yen claims, the remaining amount of Bitcoin will be worth hundreds of millions of dollars. The CEO of the exchange claimed in a court hearing that the assets of a company that is under bankruptcy proceedings are typically sold off at a big discount.
While he may have a point, the current trading volume across Bitcoin exchanges totals to an average daily volume of north of $2.5 billion. Assuming the liquidators split the sale of the company’s bitcoins into enough blocks, the demand may be quickly absorbed by the market.
A Risk to BTC Prices?
The risk to the price level of Bitcoin from an abrupt sale of the assets of the former biggest exchange for the leading cryptocurrency is not to be underestimated. The confidence in Bitcoin is only as big as its secure transaction reliability.
While it has turned into one of the most speculative assets in history, the demand for Bitcoin is so far quite shock-absorbing. The Fork associated with the creating of Bitcoin cash was weathered rather well in August (save for some disruptions to prices of the new currency on some exchanges).
A steady supply of Bitcoin worth as much as $1.43 billion has not yet been unloaded onto the market. So until we see the markets in action, everything is just speculation. But hey, we’re talking about Bitcoin, so that’s just normal.
