Mt. Gox goes dark, while Bitcoin prices plummet
Last night Mt. Gox, the largest and well known Bitcoin market went dark last night. A well known Bitcoin blogger, posted an update Monday night that claimed Mt. Gox had a system glitch where some 744,408 bitcoins, the equivalent of about $350 million, had gone missing. This along with Mt. Gox going dark has sent the already unstable Bitcoin price free falling. The price January 9th was around $900 with todays price sitting around $500. The more countries which ban the crypto-currency cause the value to decrease, and in some cases drastically.
The failure of Mt. Gox and their lack of communication hurts the whole Bitcoin community, and puts everyone who’s invested in this at a larger risk.The competetion got together in wake of this news and released a group message from Coinbase, Kraken, Bitstamp.net, BTC China, Blockchain.info and Circle denouncing Mt. Gox:
This tragic violation of the trust of users of Mt.Gox was the result of one company’s actions and does not reflect the resilience or value of bitcoin and the digital currency industry. There are hundreds of trustworthy and responsible companies involved in bitcoin. These companies will continue to build the future of money by making bitcoin more secure and easy to use for consumers and merchants. As with any new industry, there are certain bad actors that need to be weeded out, and that is what we are seeing today. Mtgox has confirmed its issues in private discussions with other members of the bitcoin community.
While the prices have stabilized their is still worry that Mt. Gox has lost millions of Bitcoins in this theft. With no central bank there is no one to stop the prices from falling, but there’s speculation that big time Bitcoin investors may step in to stop the currencies free fall.
Mt. Gox’s site currently reads:
Dear MtGox Customers,
In the event of recent news reports and the potential repercussions on MtGox’s operations and the market, a decision was taken to close all transactions for the time being in order to protect the site and our users. We will be closely monitoring the situation and will react accordingly.
Best regards,
MtGox Team
Whatever happens this event has set back the Bitcoin currency years from where it was. With the rise of other crypto-currencies could we see another rise to replace the dominate Bitcoin? Tell us if you’ve lost any Bitcoins in this or if you even own Bitcoins currently.