Why might BitFinex suspend margin trading, mostly shorting,…
Why might BitFinex suspend margin trading, mostly shorting, on BSV, when they hate BSV and Craig?
For guidance, look no further than Sammie Fries. When FTX was taken over by Mr Ray (who closed out Enron), he said the FTX books were the worst he's ever seen, and he's seen a bunch of frauds. He intimated that all that was there was some spreadsheets. Most, especially the rigged media who want Sammie to look good bc he's very politically connected, viewed this to mean that Sammie was aloof and a poorly organized guy who just couldn't keep track of everything. This is the NARRATIVE Sammie wants you to believe. But is it the reality? Maybe Sammie did what all GOOD criminals do, and "delete the logs" before the company was turned over? Even the CIA man who brought all but one Anonymous member AND #FreeRoss Ullbricht to justice said criminals shouldn't leave notes un-deleted!
So if you're gonna crook, then be good at deleting records and files. This is likely why Mr Ray found nothing but some spreadsheets with FTX's numbers on them. He certainly wasn't going to find the TRADES! Mu ah hah hah!
So, if BitFinex has been involved with some BSV manipulations, such as maybe rigging a double-spend attack to hit right after BSV hit $492 on a "Satoshi Spike", then just the record of shorting on BitFinex could be used by a prosecutor to understand the sentiment at that moment in time before the highly-coordinated attack was planned. But how would BitFinex trades and volumes and charts show this?
When some large entity with a big name arranges a hit, it's always executed by underlings, mafia style. Those underlings, however, can give out little "hints" to brothers, sisters, mothers, friends, etc…. "Shrimp" as the cryptoBros call them. Those shrimp don't get to trade on Binance Pro and Coinbase Pro or Genesis Trading (for funds only), and so they go to a retail site which offers "legal" shorting (with borrow). BitFinex. But these shrimp, when combined, can create a tell, like short-interest climbing right before it's a perfect time to short BSV. How did they know? A good prosecutor would simply hunt them down using subpeonas, and ASK them! When asked, with a little pressure of prosecution, people squeek. Shrimp especially don't mind squeeking, and they turn in the mafiaoso underlings, who then turn in the "bosses" or "whales". Anti-BSV whales are VERY well known. Keep in mind BitMart, the exchange who supposedly didn't know how to do ANY KYC/AML for customer, was the only one which was "hacked" by the double-spend attack, and is owned by none other than Vitalik Buterin.
No accusations here! Just pointing to some facts you can look up yourself.
So magically, let's say short interest on BitFinex goes up, right before that Summer 2021 attack, with BSV at $400 plus. Then with perfect timing, a multi-pronged pre-coordinated attack occurs. Well, SOMEONE knew that attack was coming, yes? So like an Al Quaheda shorting an airline before 9/11, word gets out on the "fix" and shrimp and playas begin putting on their shorts ahead of the fix. BUT, a trail is left behind on both instances (including 9/11) which can investigated later. So what's a mafia gangsta to do? DELETE THE LOGS.
This is very SUSPECT if an organization just deletes logs. Sure, if SBF does it at the very end, it's because it's necessary. But SBF's finances weren't really public, so much easier. BitFinex's short interest and charts relating to its BSV derivatives ARE publicly accessible with screenshots and other techniques (maybe even an API?). So what to do?
From my research experience, do you know what's really hard? Getting old data which you remember was easily begotten in 2007, like the top 20 websites of that era. That USED to be easy. Now it's hard, because data companies have died, the internet changes, and people lose interest in old information. One thing that's REALLY hard to get, is even simple price charts on stocks which have gone bankrupt. PurchasePro (PPRO) was a big stinky short of mine, but there's been many in my career (BIDS, MPPP, AHWY, Pets.com, some small banks from the real estate collapse like BKUNA, etc…), which is even now hard to get information on, despite being readily on the internet at the time of the short, 20 years ago. But when a company goes bankrupt, the data companies like Yahoo finance and Bloomberg and others can begin to stop providing the data, as who wants info on a pancaked bankrupt stock? Well, historians maybe, but there aren't many financial historians worth a salt. But prosecutors are also game to want that access.
So what do you do, if you wanna delete the logs? DELIST! As fast as you can. Make it so you can say 'well, we delisted, why would we save the logs?". Voila, you have a legit-sounding excuse, and can delete logs and telltale data without worry of looking suspect.
It's like you can delete all the person's records, of the person you just murdered. Phone calls …
Replies
Hi John,do you think the end of margin trading will raise prices?
I think the end of margin trading is a declaration of "impatience" and "defeat".
I still see evidence BSV is manipulated despite this change at BitFinex.
BitFinex has ironically, despite the well deserved dirt attached to their brand and USDT, never bothered me— as their short book appeared to be at least based on borrowed BSV custodied at BitFinex. But even that is an assumption as I’ve never dived deep into BitFinex. I pay more attention to volume when it comes to price and all the volume is on OKex so that’s where I think manipulation occurs.
My advice to Bitcoin Association is to request BSV be taken down from OKex which is heavily derivative-based exchange.
“Derivatives” and “naked shorting” are same type of thing, and it’s quite bad for fair markets unless well-defined well-policed rules are in place by the exchange itself.
Commodities are well suited to manipulation until the commodities produce cash flows (like SLictionary’s SLicDef tokens) at a significant rate to overcome manipulators. But even funadamenal bitcoin utility can be overcome in certain cases, and BSV qualifies.
So while I view shutdown of BSV as a positive for BSV— moving in correct direction— I don’t see it as a major cure all wrt BSV’s unfair suppressed market.
Focus attention on Binance, BitFinex/Tether’s solvency and OKex to get closer to fair price discovery on BSV.
But we’re seeing light at the end of the tunnel at least— more work to do by BA IMHO.
John, thanks for the deep insight.
I love your writing.
I agree that the price manipulation is not completely over and we need to be careful with “Derivatives”OKEx,Binance,Tether. @BitcoinAssn
little by little, things seem to be moving in the right direction.
John, thanks for the reply!