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U.S. Regulators to Subpoena Crypto Exchange Bitfinex, Tether

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Re: U.S. Regulators to Subpoena Crypto Exchange Bitfinex, Tether

#141

Post by demosthenes111 »

bhouston wrote: post #130

How long until USDT is delisted from most other exchanges? I wonder which is the larger risk, USDT coming unpegged, or just straight out being delisted from nearly all exchanges?

Delisting is probably the best case scenario imo. If the dung hits the fan with Tether while many exchanges are based on it, it could be a very bad thing for the entire cryptocurrency market. I could definitely see that scenario causing a massive "bank run" where many people try to pull their money out at the same time and several major exchanges go insolvent, resulting in mtgox style loss of confidence in cryptocurrency in general.

Delisting would hopefully signal that "we know there's sketchy stuff happening there, so we are working around it and finding solutions." And it would insulate the exhanges from huge price swings on every USDT/* trading pair.

Re: U.S. Regulators to Subpoena Crypto Exchange Bitfinex, Tether

#143

Post by GenericsMotors »

HockeyPlayer wrote: post #81

How trustworthy is Kraken? Tether looks like a good short since if it is a fraud it will go way down and if it isn't a fraud it will stay right where it is. I'm in the US and would like to short Tether. But I want to get paid if I'm right.

> How trustworthy is Kraken?

They spoof their order books and use wash trading bots...so draw your own conclusions :)

Eg:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wz-ziPfP00M

Re: U.S. Regulators to Subpoena Crypto Exchange Bitfinex, Tether

#144

Post by dragonwriter »

gressquel wrote: post #4

Its shocking how they have been allowed to continue printing "fake money" for so long. There were rumours going around long before christmas. Its about time this 'scam' was exposed.

> Its shocking how they have been allowed to continue printing "fake money" for so long. There were rumours going around long before christmas.

The subpoenas were issued December 6; just because the news just broke doesn't mean that the government just got involved.

Re: U.S. Regulators to Subpoena Crypto Exchange Bitfinex, Tether

#145

Post by gruez »

spookthesunset wrote: post #136
gruez wrote: post #123

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> But it won't take your USDT and turn it back into dollars. that's... unlikely. mainly because if that were true, nobody would want to sell anything at bitfinex, and cryptocurrency prices there would skyrocket. this happened at mtgox when they halted withdraws, BTC prices skyrocketed there.

Has anybody here on HN been able to go $ANYTHING -> USD on Bitfinex? I haven't seen anybody anywhere claim they've gotten USD out of Bitfinex...

I'd like to verify that myself; I even made a bitfinex account (with vpn). But the withdraw USD option (both wire and USDT) are disabled unless you can verify your account.

Re: U.S. Regulators to Subpoena Crypto Exchange Bitfinex, Tether

#146

Post by moduspol »

mitchellberry wrote: post #137
moduspol wrote: post #124

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Exchanges don't actually hold the things they're trading. They're just matchmakers who take a percentage when trades occur. Anything creating high volume benefits exchanges, even if that volume is everyone trying to sell their tethers for other crypto.

>Exchanges don't actually hold the things they're trading. Bitfinex has a few billion in publicly known cold wallets.

Well Bitfinex is a special case relating to Tether, but I'm sure all exchanges hold some amount of money in some way to support operations. It's just misunderstanding how exchanges work to think a price drop in a thing being traded puts exchanges at risk.

It would only do so if the exchange has a strange unrelated agreement (like to trade 1 USDT for 1 USD), or were holding the money they're using to run their operation in that asset. Except for maybe Bitfinex (because of the special case), no exchanges are doing that with USDT.

Re: U.S. Regulators to Subpoena Crypto Exchange Bitfinex, Tether

#147

Post by zaroth »

Read as far as “Tether has yet to verify 2.3 Billion in reserves” and started laughing so hard I have tears running down my face right now.

Good god how could you even write that and not immediately understand the whole thing is a shitshow scam run by a bunch of clowns?

Someone fancies themselves an offshoot of the US treasury and is taking their new printing presses for a spin.

Hell if I had my own little US mint I’d be running it 24/7 too!

Re: U.S. Regulators to Subpoena Crypto Exchange Bitfinex, Tether

#148

Post by ttul »

arez wrote: post #79
profuse99 wrote: post #46

Earlier quoted context omitted.

correct. phil potter is director at both bitfinex and tether. tethers get deposited straight to bitfinex upon creation as far as i understand it. source: https://offshoreleaks.icij.org/nodes/82024464

yes that's true. You can even see the tether printer and the sends of tether on the omni network. The omni network is a layer on top of bitcoin and is totally transparent

Can you show us where we can find these transactions?

Re: U.S. Regulators to Subpoena Crypto Exchange Bitfinex, Tether

#149

Post by tannhauser23 »

onewhonknocks wrote: post #125

They updated the article several hours later with: 'The U.S. Commodity Futures Trading Commission sent subpoenas on Dec. 6 to virtual-currency venue Bitfinex and Tether, a company that issues a widely traded coin and claims it’s pegged to the dollar, according to a person familiar with the matter, who asked not to be identified discussing private information.'

So when did the auditor quit? Before or after the subpoena?

I wonder if the auditor made a 'noisy withdrawal', basically alerting the regulators that this company is fraudulent.

Re: U.S. Regulators to Subpoena Crypto Exchange Bitfinex, Tether

#150

Post by GenericsMotors »

hinkley wrote: post #58

I am not proud of the degree of schadenfreude I am experiencing right now. I’m actually craving popcorn. Is anyone at all surprised that they got subpoenaed?

> Is anyone at all surprised that they got subpoenaed?

Not very surprised, no. It was just a matter of time until it became public:

https://pbs.twimg.com/media/DRGSIPEW4AEi_Du.jpg

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