The post Empire Newsletter: Could bitcoin take a hit from Mt Gox creditors? appeared on BitcoinEthereumNews.com.

Don’t panic Movement of bitcoin from the known Mt Gox wallet to a new address early Tuesday caused some, uh, concern in markets as investors fretted that $9 billion worth of bitcoin could be sold.  Obviously, that would be a huge pressure point on the market, but let’s be clear: That’s not the case…yet. And — depending on who you talk to — might not be the case at all.  Unlike the US bankruptcies we’ve talked about, the Mt Gox bankruptcy is quite murky even as we near the end of a 10-year-long process (Mt Gox went bankrupt in 2014).  But a combination of factors — the overseas bankruptcy, the missing bitcoin, etc — made this case look a lot different than, say, FTX. Clearly, the market’s feeling anxiety over it based on the drop we saw yesterday.  So let’s look at what we know. Former CEO Mark Karpelès assured people that the move early Tuesday was made to prepare for distributions. The estate then put out a statement echoing Karpelès. None of this is out of the norm, as the trustee has to prepare for the distributions, which have a deadline of October 21.  Earlier this year, people on Reddit started posting that they were receiving emails from the estate to confirm their identity and account details, in what seemed to be one of the first moves to repay customers. The emails also said that distributions would be made in-kind, meaning that creditors would receive bitcoin or bitcoin cash instead of fiat. (Though some were able to receive fiat payouts.) That followed previous reports in December of customers receiving payouts in yen.  Galaxy Research’s Alex Thorn offered some clarity in a research note late Tuesday, noting that the creditors had options for their payouts and some could opt for…

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Filed under: News - @ May 29, 2024 6:16 pm