It appears that domain investor Andy Booth has sold his Gox.com domain name to the parent company of Bitcoin exchange Mt. Gox, which is currently offline as of this posting. Based on the Whois information, the deal appears to have been transacted within the last few days. Gox.com is still listed on the Booth.com website.
On February 21, 2014, Andy Booth was listed as the domain name registrant, according to a historical Whois record. According to the current Whois record, the registrant of the domain name is now Mark Karpeles of Tibanne Co. Ltd., the company that operates the MtGox.com Bitcoin exchange. If you visit Gox.com, you will notice that the domain name currently forwards to MtGox.com.
During the last month, Mt. Gox has faced some serious issues that prevented clients from withdrawing their Bitcoin holdings. I don’t own any Bitcoin, so I am not the best person to discuss what has been happening with the company.
It is interesting that the company made this domain name acquisition in light of all of the news about the company. I am sure there will be more details revealed in the coming days.
I reached out to Andy seeking details, and when he responds to my email, I will update this article.
Update from Andy Booth: “Basically I got gox.com like any other LLL – didn’t directly target Mt Gox. My brother met domain broker Joe Politzer in Singapore who got excited about gox.com and then I said he could try to sell it if he wanted. He called Karpeles and Gox to find out if they wanted it and immediately they expressed pretty strong interest. I’ve asked Mark if it’s ok to publish details (no response as yet).”
Here’s an update from Joe Politzer of DN.BIZ, broker of Gox.com, with more details.
Really strange aren’t they just about gone? Only think I can think of is it was a deal done some time ago and only transferring now. Mr Booth may well have a chance to buy it back soon.
Hope he didn’t get paid in bitcoin from their exchange. Its only gossip at the moment but appears they are done and may have many legal and criminal charges coming.
At any rate congrats to Andy!
“It is interesting that the company made this domain name acquisition in light of all of the news about the company.”
This document: http://www.scribd.com/doc/209050732/MtGox-Situation-Crisis-Strategy-Draft found at the end of this article:
http://www.wired.com/wiredenterprise/2014/02/bitcoins-mt-gox-implodes/
says they are rebranding “From MtGox to Gox Apr 1st 2014 or later”.
I’m not sure where that document came from but odd how events seem to be unfolding as the document.
I confirm that we brokered the name for Andy and his brother James as stated above. I sent Elliot a few more details on it. Maybe he will post them in the morning.
Just shows going for shorter name is still the trend.
Ask him to buy my domain BitcoinSolutions.com … he might need it … lol
Well done on the sale Andy!
Mt Gox must have positive expectations for the future with this purchase, especially when forwarding gox.com to a realistically negative lander!
Howie.
Maybe they bought it with some of the 740,000 Bitcoins they ripped off from consumers.
“”I have no idea” where they are, said Burges, the trader. “I’m both annoyed and worried.”
On bitcoin exchanges, the currency’s value has fallen to about $470 from $550 in the past few hours, a figure already down more than 50 percent on the price of $1,200 per bitcoin reached on Mt. Gox three months ago.
The disappearance of Mt. Gox could be fatal for Bitcoin, which was started in 2009 as a currency free from government controls. Bitcoin’s boosters say the currency’s design make it impossible to counterfeit and difficult to manipulate, and the virtual money has won an eclectic mix of die-hard fans, including libertarians, tech enthusiasts and adventurous investors.”
http://www.foxnews.com/tech/2014/02/25/major-bitcoin-exchange-website-goes-offline/
This is all part of a detailed plan involving massive insider theft by who I believe to be Mark Karpeles. He has been running a fractional exchange for quite some time, intentionally misleading investors with false hope and incredibly vague press releases. This re-branding will attempt to drum up new customer support, in an effort to generate new profits and use those new profits to partially pay back certain creditors/investors. This will psychologically remove much of the blame placed on Karpeles by those who have lost bitcoins/fiat, for they will suddenly be receiving some compensation on losses where they thought there would be none. Since he is already absolved of financial liability after filing bankruptcy, once this whole thing blows over he will slither away and wait for the best time to cash out his stolen coins.
The article below is a very well researched and very informatively written timeline of Karpeles’ and Gox’s actions from 2011 leading up to their collapse.
http://falkvinge.net/2014/02/28/the-gox-crater-crowd-detectives-reveal-billion-dollar-heist-as-inside-job/