Shaun Altman: Liquidating Ginko’s Recovered Assets Will be VERY Slow
by Alphaville Herald on 11/11/07 at 3:48 pm
by Pixeleen Mistral, National Affairs desk
Now in possession of 8.7 million shares of BNT virtual stock, the Von Mises sim, and some spare change, Shaun Altman is faced with a daunting task. A little over a week after the originally scheduled announcement, Mr. Altman has released an accounting of the recovered assets of failed ponzi scheme virtual bank Ginko Financial.
The task Mr. Altman has taken on is to convert the recovered assets into Linden dollars that may be redistributed to former Ginko investors. Unfortunately, the virtual stock markets do not typically move large volumes of shares, as Mr. Altman acknowledges in his press release, saying, “I expect this to be a VERY slow process, as liquidity in the virtual stock markets is extremely limited”.
Here in the press room we cannot help but wonder what the news of 8 million shares of BNT stock for sale will do for the stock’s long term prospects – it would seem that any price rally for BNT will immediately be dampened by a sell-off from Mr. Altman’s pool of stock. Is Mr. Altman in a position to control the price of BNT’s stock as he attempts to liquidate his position? There would appear to be a number of interesting questions about how Mr. Altman will discharge his fiduciary responsibilities here.
Some observers suggested that Mr. Altman might want to sell the Von Mies sim now and refund that money to the former Ginko “investors” immediately. The alternative would be to invest the money he recovers from the sim sale in a virtual bank – and we all know how well that sort of thing works.
The text of Mr. Altman’s announcement is after the jump.
GINKO LIQUIDATION UPDATE
The virtual asset recovery window for the virtual Ginko liquidation trust has closed. No additional virtual assets proved to be recoverable.
What was recovered:
BNT virtual Stock – 8,783,436 Shares
RIS virtual Stock – 1,667 Shares
Land – 1 Second Life Region (Von Mises)
Known Unrecoverable Virtual Assets:
HCL virtual Stock – 8,800,000 Shares, LukeConnell Vandeverre in possession.
Liquidation of recovered virtual assets has begun. I expect this to be a VERY slow process, as liquidity in the virtual stock markets is extremely limited. I am presently advising any Ginko victims who would like to benefit from this virtual asset liquidation to HOLD their virtual WTF shares, or to consider buying them back if they have already been sold for L$. IF you choose to sell your virtual WTF shares, the buyer of your virtual shares will benefit in your place, and your recovery will be limited to the L$ you receive from the sale of your virtual shares.
A third press release will be circulated to major Second Life media centers when liquidation of recovered virtual assets is complete. Due to the uncertain nature of the virtual stock markets, I have no firm timeline to share with you at present. Please watch my blog at http://www.shaunaltman.com/ for occasional updates.
Observer
Nov 12th, 2007
I wonder how something that someone just decides is “stock” suddenly becomes “stock”.
Guess what? It’s not.
Uccello Poultry
Nov 12th, 2007
:::looks hard for Very, Very Slow on her calendar and wonders how much of her nearly $250USD she’ll recover:::
How about some investigative reporting, not just rehashing press releases? Dig deep into other ‘banks’ and maybe the WSE. It all seems to me like a huge ‘boys club’ where the ordinary individual is a pawn in someone else’s World of Finance Role Play.
Obscure Doodad
Nov 12th, 2007
Weird, out of curiosity I popped over to Van Mises sim. Shaun Altman is not the owner. Brautigan and Tuck Group is the owner. Yet Altman says he has “recovered” that “asset”.
I smell scam.
A ginko ' victim'
Nov 12th, 2007
Very slow process?
Not our problem, is it?
Mr. Altman personally assumed responsibility for paying back Mr. Ginko’s customers, so I will be expecting the still outstanding L$ back on my account soon.
How long Mr. Altman will have to wait to retrieve the money he’s going to pay to the Ginko customers, is his problem, not ours.
Obscurely Illiterate
Nov 13th, 2007
Obscure, if you’d paid attention, you’d note that BNT is acting as an agent to liquidate the land in the sim. Ginko owned the land, not the estate. Lurk moar, Doodad…
Rasah Tigereye
Nov 13th, 2007
“A ginko ‘ victim’” seems to assume that Mr. Altman has actually assumed responsibility for what happened with Ginko. He hasn’t, and is simply doing this as a free service. If it takes him a long time, it’s at least better than the alternative, which is nothing.
FYI, I had over $750 in Ginko.
a ginko victim
Nov 13th, 2007
Assumed responsibility or whatever you wanna call it…
He now has all the valuables that Mr. Ginko used to have, that is not either of theirs, and belongs to everyone who put even a single Linden into those machines.
I don’t care who does it, but that money belongs to the people like you and me, who put money in there. It needs to go back to where it belongs.
In this case. Mr. Altman has it. It’s ours. It’s his responsibility now to get it where it belongs.
If he didnt want the problem of making that happen, he shouldnt have taken over that problem over from Mr. Ginko.
And letting Mr. Ginko’s RL posessions being sold off to pay for the mess, is always still an option.
In buisness, if you don’t wanna get burned, don’t take risks. I learned a lesson in any case: if you don’t know em RL, people on SL cannot be trusted.
Obscure Doodad
Nov 13th, 2007
>>
Obscure, if you’d paid attention, you’d note that BNT is acting as an agent to liquidate the land in the sim. Ginko owned the land, not the estate. Lurk moar, Doodad…
>>
Well, Shaun, I hope it all works out for your efforts to return money to those scammed, but I think you will find that when you sell your RL house/property, your real estate agent — you know, the person who is trying to liquidate/sell it for you — does not take ownership of it as part of that sales process. BNT is shown as owner of that land. Not you.
That sim is listed as an asset recovered, but it is not in your name. So . . . if you’re an alt of BNT or vice versa, maybe you can make a case for having “recovered” it. Otherwise, someone other than you owns it.
And also, btw, if this “agent” relationship exists, and you are an alt of BNT or vice versa . . . this agent relationship for “liquidation” — involves how much sales commission percentage? 10%? Suppose you sell it to another alt and “collect” that 10% and do this 10 times. The “value” left to report to Ginko shareholders for dispersal to them is then what? Right. Zero.
Don’t run whatever scams you’re running, man. It’s real money. You have to look in the mirror the rest of your life. It’s not worth it. People did stupid things. Why not make provide them a pleasant surprise, rather than try to take more from them.