The Mt. Gox trustee tasked to sell approximately 200,000 bitcoin is suspected to have dumped another 8,000 bitcoin on the cryptocurrency market, and this may be in part to blame for the overnight dip in Bitcoin and other cryptocurrency prices.
Unlike traditional financial markets, the total cryptocurrency market is very volatile, and despite an explosion in recent years is still relatively low volume compared to entities such as NASDAQ, or other investments such as gold. A sudden sell-off of more than 8,000 Bitcoin (approximately $72 million at last night’s price) could certainly influence the entire cryptocurrency market and impact the total market cap.
Over the last few months, despite public scrutiny and backlash, the Mt. Gox trustee has continued to sell off large amounts of Bitcoin on public exchanges, even after they admitted they knew it could cause negative impacts on the market.
Today, four separate addresses linked to the Mt. Gox trustee have transferred 2,000 BTC each, presumably to sell them off for money. Local Japanese financial authorities have tasked the trustee to convert over 200,000 Bitcoin to yen, and so far the quickest way they’ve found is to sell on online exchanges.
With more and more financial institutions entering the Bitcoin marketplace, it would make sense for the trustee to privately connect with them, and create an arrangement to sell a large amount directly, to help fund initial accounts for institutions such as Goldman Sachs, or NASDAQ.
Instead, the trustee is continuing to sell off coins in public markets, and until the Mt. Gox coffers run dry — or until they do find an alternate arrangement — they may continue causing havoc on the cryptocurrency market at their whim.
Meanwhile, those who lost their coins during the Mt. Gox debacle continue to cry foul at the actions of the trustee. The original sale raised enough to cover claims, fees, and lawsuits, yet coins are continuing to be sold off. As of today, there are 137,891 BTC left in the Mt. Gox account, according to Reddit user Iamhollywood5.
Anyone interested in following the Mt. Gox insolvency process or catching up on what’s happened can find lots of reading material at the Mt. Gox Insolvency subreddit.
