Mt. Gox rose again today to announce it is now working with Japanese police to investigate what happened to the bitcoins it lost, misplaced, or had stolen by hackers.
The statement, posted on the homepage on letterhead bearing CEO Mark Karpeles’ name, said:
Following its application for commencement of civil rehabilitation, MtGox Co., Ltd. consulted with the metropolitan police department with regard to the disappearance of bitcoins which is one of the causes for said application. MtGox Co., Ltd. hereby announces that it has submitted necessary electronic records and other related documents.
MtGox Co., Ltd. intends to fully cooperate with each competent authority. Further, MtGox Co., Ltd. continues to make efforts to clarify facts as quickly as possible and to recover from damages.
The announcement is carefully worded, not mentioning whether Mt. Gox chose to consult with the police, whether the police came to Mt. Gox, or if it was just a routine matter as part of the civil rehabilitation process. According to a report by Reuters, the police do not intend to make any further statement on the matter.
Other than knowing the authorities are involved somehow, and the words “recover from damages” at the end, the update probably does little to comfort those who lost large sums of money when Mt. Gox declared bankruptcy nearly a month ago.
Rumor file
Another tiny ray of hope today came in the form of a tweet by Eren Canarslan, an investment banker from Turkey:
Within a few days(or hours) @MtGox will announce that “they found ~670.000 #bitcoin & may release some BTCs to the victims. @PatronaPartners
— Eren Canarslan (@CanarslanEren) March 25, 2014
The one-off tweet, followed by nearly a whole day of radio silence (that as of press time still hadn’t been broken) probably would have been written off as trolling or wishful thinking had it not been for these two other cryptic tweets he’d posted on 4th and 5th March:
@PatronaPartners As I heard from an insider from @blockchain: they found lost #bitcoin of @mtgox Note: It’s not an investment advice/offer.
— Eren Canarslan (@CanarslanEren) March 4, 2014
@zeroblock @PatronaPartners @blockchain I talked with Mark Karpeles, the news is good !
— Eren Canarslan (@CanarslanEren) March 5, 2014
Within two weeks, Mt. Gox announced it had discovered 200,000 BTC in an ‘old format’ wallet. In the world of lost bitcoins, this has bestowed a kind of prophetic status on Eren Canarslan, whose bitcoin-associated follower count increased markedly over the day.
It has not yet been established what his connection is to Mark Karpeles, Blockchain, or any insider information. The 4th March post drew a bemused response from ZeroBlock, Blockchain’s subsidiary.
It has also raised interest in the company he was supposedly tweeting to, Hong Kong’s Patrona Partners. That company responded by tweeting “Only thing I know he is not trolling,” with a link to an image of Canarslan’s earlier post.
We await, like a flock of seagulls around a small child, the next morsel either Mt. Gox or its claimed ‘insiders’ toss in our direction.
Japan police image via Shutterstock