Bitcoin Exchange Mt. Gox is Financially Doomed

The Bitcoin nexus Mt. Gox files for bankruptcy protection with outstanding debt of $63.6M. The rumors had been all over the place since quite some time but today the digital currency exchange is financially doomed.

A total loss of 750,000 in bitcoins occurred on Mt. Gox. This was announced on Friday and it was tragic news indeed. Mt. Gox is bankrupt and it has nothing to show the world in the way of any remaining assets. There was a time when it was the top digital currency hub on a global level. 

But today all that is no more. The CEO of Mt. Gox, Mark Karpeles bowed in a gesture of contrition to the press recently. Over 100,000 of the bitcoins owned by the exchange itself got stolen too. The net total siphoned off from the coffers amounted to $473 million. 

The rumors had been running rife throughout the time spanning the previous months. But now the truth is out and it is an ugly truth indeed. A bug in the system had caused the biggest heist east of Suez. 

It seems that when you deal in risky speculations and that too in cyberspace where anything goes, the resultant fruit is sometimes very bitter. 

The CEO of Mt. Gox had great difficulty articulating his apology to the audience and press reporters. He obviously felt truly bad about what had happened. But this will not bring all that money lost forever in the airwaves of the Internet.  

And the really shocking thing is that this was all kept hidden from the public for so long. By cheating its customers, the top brass of Mt. Gox have only added insult to injury. The complaints from the clientele had reached the level of an infinite scream a la Edvard Munch. 

Finally, Mt. Gox’s CEO relented and filed for bankruptcy. The company is insolvent for all purposes and the future remains precarious. A solution to the current problem doesn’t appear to be forthcoming. Efforts at reconstruction will take a lot of hard work which is the one scarce commodity in today’s world.  

Source: WSJ