Author Topic: Need $10K bitUSD, will pay actual USD with 5% premium  (Read 7912 times)

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Offline luckybit

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Here's an alternative to bitUSD. Why don't you use bitCNY temporarily? It now have a great liquidity, about $6,000 (1.4 mil BTS)
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To be honest I don't know whether or not it's a scam but the only way to find out is to give them the opportunity to earn our trust.
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Offline nomoreheroes7

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Thanks for clearing things up tsaishen. I for one can't wait to hear what you guys have in store. I've always thought that your postings were legit; seems pretty obvious to me from your posts that you're serious about this whole thing. I mean come on, you even offered escrow in your OP; it's ridiculous to see a bunch of community members immediately jump down your throat and scream scam without hearing you out first. You clearly have big plans for BTS and should be welcome with open arms, especially considering the rough past few months.

Just remember that the cries of a few outspoken community members are not at all representative of the community at large. Myself and I'm sure many others are eagerly awaiting to hear more.

Offline tsaishen

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Thanks tsaishen for the explanation.
I agree that if Bytemaster or some other trusted person provides escrow for the trade then it cannot be a scam.  (I didnt read it as a scam, but I understand how people who see "send me money and i'll send you back bonus bitUSD" could see that as a big red flag if they didnt see the escrow part).


When you get negative reactions about from people here right now you should remember that most of us here got burned hard over the past couple months, so there is a lot of anger.  Just general anger at everything, not directed at anyone in particular.  Anger looking for something to blame, regardless of whether that was the cause of the pain.

There is also the feeling that various projects in the Bitshares ecosystem have promised us all rewards in the future, but has asked for donations in the present, such as the Notes IPO, the PLAY IPO, and the Moonstone wallet.  With all of these things competing for our dollars and bitcoins, people just arent buying BTS, or they are selling off BTS to get dollars/bitcoins to put into these IPOs and investments. 

It feels like the community in general has been completely trashing the BTS price in order to raise funds for all the projects people want to run. 

At some point, many of us want to scream: "If you want Bitshares to do well and attract people, stop blowing all your money on all this stuff and f*cking buy some BTS already.  That way maybe we can stop the downtrend so that crypto investors will be interested in Bitshares again, it wont just look like something that is dying and goes down every single day". 


Your post looked like more of that to me.  "Hey, lets sell some BTS to get fiat so I can send you USD and get extra bitUSD in return!" 

I would think that the people you are hiring are bulls and would probably want BTS right now.  I would react very positively if you said "Hey, how about we spend $X000 buying up a lot of BTS and we pay you guys in BTS (based on pre-agred upon BTS values that we paid for it)".

Trying to use bitUSD is great, but at some point given how severely the price of BTS has fallen, we just want someone who says they believe in the project to go buy some BTS and help get this moving in the right direction again.

Just seeing this now Ander.  Thanks, I get it.  I know I come off as completely clueless sometimes, but I've been burned by crypto scams in the past so I know better too.  That's why I ask for absolutely no trust, and just a solid intermediary on these things.  Nothing we are doing requires any level of trust between strangers, it's the beauty of the tech we're using.
 
We have an advantage in that most of what we need sits before us.  It's pieces of puzzle sitting on a floor.  We've figured out how all the edges line up and now it's time to snap all of those pieces together and see what that puzzle looks like.

I just need to pay the puzzle do'ers before they're willing to start ;)

Offline tsaishen

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I agree. Stinks from a mile. Lot's of red flags for my liking!

I'm failing to see a red flag here, please enlighten me what seems wrong?  Be as specific as possible.  Back your claim, I'll gladly talk about it. 


Should I quote my other post in this very thread?

Additionally why do you have to urgently pay upfront by Friday? What are those jobs that require upfront payment? Why did you start looking for money (from somebody else never the less) on Wednesday if it is so important to pay by Friday?

@tonyk2
Well the original intent was originally to pay everyone at month's end.
Then when the time came to talk about pay, it became clear that these guys would like to be paid upfront rather than in arrears.
And you know what?  I think that's fair, it's a high risk endeavor, things are super busy and if a mistake were made with payroll it could be completely devestating to our reputation.

Also no need to quote your old post, I was writing the last post when you clarified.  I re-read and then posted my clarification, so I think we're on the same page now.

I want you to know that I find your comments and skepticism helpful. 

It's hard, sitting here so close to everything to understand what the community sees.  You have only been given a very limited view as to what is coming.  I'm not the worlds best communicator, and chatting on a forum is not the best avenue to communicate a bigger picture.
Operating under silence hasn't helped, but on the other hand now we're this close to launch we can start to speak much more freely. 

Now, interestingly enough I'm not sure this thread is needed anymore.  It was predicated on the assumption that moving that much of the market could cause it to destabilize.  Instability is what will kill your currency, not low price.

clayop pointed out https://blocktrades.us/ which does have enough liquidity to clear the remainder of what we have left.
So thanks for that!

**updated to reflect the proper name of the person I was speaking to**
« Last Edit: April 15, 2015, 11:36:41 pm by tsaishen »

Offline Ander

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Thanks tsaishen for the explanation.
I agree that if Bytemaster or some other trusted person provides escrow for the trade then it cannot be a scam.  (I didnt read it as a scam, but I understand how people who see "send me money and i'll send you back bonus bitUSD" could see that as a big red flag if they didnt see the escrow part).


When you get negative reactions about from people here right now you should remember that most of us here got burned hard over the past couple months, so there is a lot of anger.  Just general anger at everything, not directed at anyone in particular.  Anger looking for something to blame, regardless of whether that was the cause of the pain.

There is also the feeling that various projects in the Bitshares ecosystem have promised us all rewards in the future, but has asked for donations in the present, such as the Notes IPO, the PLAY IPO, and the Moonstone wallet.  With all of these things competing for our dollars and bitcoins, people just arent buying BTS, or they are selling off BTS to get dollars/bitcoins to put into these IPOs and investments. 

It feels like the community in general has been completely trashing the BTS price in order to raise funds for all the projects people want to run. 

At some point, many of us want to scream: "If you want Bitshares to do well and attract people, stop blowing all your money on all this stuff and f*cking buy some BTS already.  That way maybe we can stop the downtrend so that crypto investors will be interested in Bitshares again, it wont just look like something that is dying and goes down every single day". 


Your post looked like more of that to me.  "Hey, lets sell some BTS to get fiat so I can send you USD and get extra bitUSD in return!" 

I would think that the people you are hiring are bulls and would probably want BTS right now.  I would react very positively if you said "Hey, how about we spend $X000 buying up a lot of BTS and we pay you guys in BTS (based on pre-agred upon BTS values that we paid for it)".

Trying to use bitUSD is great, but at some point given how severely the price of BTS has fallen, we just want someone who says they believe in the project to go buy some BTS and help get this moving in the right direction again.
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zerosum

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I agree. Stinks from a mile. Lot's of red flags for my liking!

I'm failing to see a red flag here, please enlighten me what seems wrong?  Be as specific as possible.  Back your claim, I'll gladly talk about it. 


Should I quote my other post in this very thread?

Additionally why do you have to urgently pay upfront by Friday? What are those jobs that require upfront payment? Why did you start looking for money (from somebody else never the less) on Wednesday if it is so important to pay by Friday?
« Last Edit: April 15, 2015, 10:46:29 pm by tonyk2 »

Offline tsaishen

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i dont think its a scam.. seems pretty legit.. i may consider to develop their wordpress site. Time constraints are pretty tight though.
what seem legit to you?

The urgency to send money to someone?

The urgency to pay upfront by Friday and starting to look for funds on Wednesday?

The 2 times repeated nonsense statement - "We do not want to tie funds in bts for long period of time, but we are perfectly fine to kiss goodbye same funds and send them right away?" Cause this is the reason they do not want to short the bitUSD to themselves... tying up funds....but they are OK to send/spend same fund in USD... with a 5% premium never the less????

Ahh I understand now!  Thanks for clarifying your position.  No your mistake is in thinking that all of the funds the same, they are not.  They are in different places, they are earmarked to serve different purposes and have actual definitive costs to move and shift around.

I realize it's hard to follow and for that I apologize.  Here it is in the simplest form I can make it.

We are willing to pay up to $0.05 per dollar to move funds into a position by Friday, that we can then use to cover upfront payroll obligations.
We owe this up front because we promised several people, including people on this forum who can in fact verify these statements, that we would pay them in USD upfront, on or before day of launch in order to come work with us.  This was the sum of the offer.

Beyond that point, the offer is no longer as attractive as the myriad of other options that are in front of us. 
This option though slightly more expensive than paypal or ach, does build goodwill with the community and helps us to advertise our business.
We pay slightly more than putting them on regular payroll, but in exchange we get some of the people who understand bitshares the best, who have been here the longest, to come along and try to make something great.  Prove the naysayers wrong.

Offline tsaishen

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I was recently offered a job as community liaison by tsaishen, but I'm strongly recommending against this. Buying bitUSD for a premium is a huge waste of money.

1. If you have BTS, then you can create bitUSD by shorting bitUSD and then buying your own shorts. I'd expect you to have lots of BTS in reserve if you expected your activities to double the price of BTS.
2. If you don't have BTS, then you could offer your would-be employees BTC. I would accept that if I'd received that offer.
3. You could've offered to pay us would-be employees by Bank of America bank transfer, Western Union, Paypal instead of involving other forum members. Again, I would've accepted.

It's troubling that none of these ideas, which would've saved you money, hadn't occurred to you.
I'm going to reject your job offer for failure to satisfy my sole condition of acceptance.

To everyone else:
Do not send any money.

Please don't contact me again.

Thank you.
I agree. Stinks from a mile. Lot's of red flags for my liking!

I'm failing to see a red flag here, please enlighten me what seems wrong?  Be as specific as possible.  Back your claim, I'll gladly talk about it. 

I think you maybe missed where I asked a forum mod to escrow this? 
I'm literally willing to drop the entire USD cash amount into ByteMaster, or whoever's account upfront assuming they are in the USA and with a bank I've heard of.

I said all of that in my initial posting. 

In fact did I even post the address to send bitUSD to?

You guys are tearing this apart like you think we've got some scam going. 
As though I would have some interest in walking off with your $10k after hiring from the community and paying them up front. 
The amount needed is now down to $3k, since thankfully this isn't the only place I made offers.

I dunno, maybe there is something wrong with bitassets that make them unsuitable for cash transfer and payment purposes for larger amounts and if that's the case, I think we need to step back a minute and seriously consider the role bitshares plays in our larger business plan. 

BTW Volker you're released from NDA and since I know you'll be reading this you have my permission to talk about it.  We aren't in a silence period anymore, we just need to snap these last few pieces into place to make it work. 

Anyone else that we've talked it over with, is free to talk too, just censor the URL's since the sites aren't standing on their own yet and won't handle traffic until I can get back to it, which I can't do while I'm trying to get payroll settled.

So here's what I think.  I think part of the problem may be confusion in what is actually on offer. 
The more I read read volker's quit, the more I realize he read the headline and missed the offer.

I'm not offering you 5% over market on your BitShares or even 5% over market on your bitUSD, 
That would be insane and stupid. 

I'm offering 5% over the thing you're trying to peg it to, USD. 

Right now it's trading at $1.11 according to coinmarket cap. 
You would be selling for $1.05, cash USD no fees, it's a 5% loss for you yes, but the advantage is you get cash in the bank, no other fees.
You take a small loss against market, but win the day over in the fee savings column.
 
It's a compromise.  We don't want to buy at market, there isn't enough volume to support it.  You want to cash out (or you wouldn't be reading this far), but want to get the best price for your assets.
 
But let's step back a minute and assume I bought BTC and converted straight to BTS, which seems to be something people missed in my first posting when I said "We think the market can handle maybe $2k right now".

The CEO owns a network of ATMs and I think the mark to market is ~5%.
$10k USD comes out as $9.5k USD worth of BTC, alright well there's $500 gone, but...

Then we try to find that much BTS liquid, somewhere...???

Move it to BTER? 
https://bter.com/trade/btc_bitusd
https://bter.com/trade/BTS_BTC
That's what like $500 worth?

Bit38?
http://www.btc38.com/trade_en.html?mk_type=btc&btc38_trade_coin_name=bts
Getting closer, the entire 24hr volume was 9BTC or about $2000, but since that's both buys and sells, depth is probably half.

Metaexchange?
https://metaexchange.info/markets/BTS/BTC
There's about another slightly less than a BTC worth.

Shapeshift.io?
Looks like another 2.5 BTC if I'm quick with it.

Are there even any other exchanges where these pairs trade yet?
Total liquid market is WAY less than $10k, as I said before, we might be able to get $2k of it this way.

Ok but forget all that market reality stuff.
Let's assume we did manage to acquire that much BTS that we could apply to payroll?
Well to create $10k bitUSD would mean tying up $30k worth of BTS through shorts, it's not a 1:1 mapping.  Also I'm putting investor funds at risk in what would really be a speculative investment, a speculative investment that needs to ride how long?
 
More importantly, those BTS are actually spoken for.  They're happily sitting in little slots in a spreadsheet waiting to be called to action.  If I shorted bitUSD into existence, then you're talking financial malfeasance. 
We aren't speculators.  You want to speculate fine, short it to death and sell it to me, guaranteed sale for you.  Not even asking you to trust me.

All I'm doing is easing the payroll burden, and pushing around a bit of liquidity until this thing launches so there is room for it to grow.
When the time comes, I need to about to pay 15, pardon me, 14 people.  Of those, 7 or excuse me 6 are from this forum. 
But most of the staff are not in the USA.

Imagine if I just handled payroll the other ways you guys are recommending.

PayPal - 2.5%  $1.025 per dollar cost (admittedly it's the receiver that pays this cost).  This means you get $0.975 per dollar for your efforts as a contractor (employee, whatever we're calling it). 
But then we both have to deal with PayPal.  Not sure about you, but I've not liked paypal for a very long time.
You like your funds frozen for dabbling in crypto?  Ok, Let's give it a shot! 
I don't personally take paypal because the reversal rate is horrific, and I dunno about you, but I really like being able to access my funds on demand. 

The business doesn't mind paypal though, and we do have a paypal verified business account that is 5 years old and sees $50k per month in turnover, so it's no sweat to pay a contractor that way.  I just wouldn't force-ably subject them to it.

Western Union, minimum $5 cost to send $500 is ~$50 if you're doing it internationally. There are serious limits such as only sending a certain number of transfers in a day.  One guy getting paid, pretty much taps this out unless he has a WU business account setup already.  Also slogging down to a WU location and standing in line for half an hour just to fill out forms and deal with the rest of the hassle is not the best use of anyone's time.

Bank wires are cheap, in fact we can do them for free with a 5 business day delay.  Immediate transfer is $25, but it does show up at BofA immediately, other banks it might take a day or two.

I can do ACH direct deposits for $0.50 regardless of size.  To do it, you as an employee or contractor would need to have a bank in the USA, and I would need those banking details as well as regular forms that need to be filed such as a copy of ID & social security number.  But the process is painless.  I just input the details, hit send and you see your money in 3 to 5 business days.  Doesn't work at all if you're not from the USA though.

All options were on the table, but as I stated in my original postings. 

We're looking for people who want to work with us on a project that deals in bitAssets and then be paid in bitAssets.  Specifically bitUSD, because theoretically at least, 1 bitUSD should always remain right around a dollar.  This makes bookkeeping painless and simple.  I don't want to have to book-keep this past launch day.  The beancounter can handle counting the beans.  For him to take that task over, someone needs to get all the books in order first.  That's all I'm doing here.

Thanks for those who participated in this discussion so far.  It's provided valuable insight into the community that we are trying to be part of.

Offline fuzzy

i dont think its a scam.. seems pretty legit.. i may consider to develop their wordpress site. Time constraints are pretty tight though.
what seem legit to you?

The urgency to send money to someone?

The urgency to pay upfront by Friday and starting to look for funds on Wednesday?

The 2 times repeated nonsense statement - "We do not want to tie funds in bts for long period of time, but we are perfectly fine to kiss goodbye same funds and send them right away?" Cause this is the reason they do not want to short the bitUSD to themselves... tying up funds....but they are OK to send/spend same fund in USD... with a 5% premium never the less????

I just meant that they seem like an honest startup.. its a good idea.. I got the rundown via PM... however not sure about the premium they are paying.. i know they want to roll it out very quickly.. but maybe speaks more about their lack of organization or preparation... perhaps they can push dates back so it can happen properly.
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Offline jsidhu

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i dont think its a scam.. seems pretty legit.. i may consider to develop their wordpress site. Time constraints are pretty tight though.
what seem legit to you?

The urgency to send money to someone?

The urgency to pay upfront by Friday and starting to look for funds on Wednesday?

The 2 times repeated nonsense statement - "We do not want to tie funds in bts for long period of time, but we are perfectly fine to kiss goodbye same funds and send them right away?" Cause this is the reason they do not want to short the bitUSD to themselves... tying up funds....but they are OK to send/spend same fund in USD... with a 5% premium never the less????

I just meant that they seem like an honest startup.. its a good idea.. I got the rundown via PM... however not sure about the premium they are paying.. i know they want to roll it out very quickly.. but maybe speaks more about their lack of organization or preparation... perhaps they can push dates back so it can happen properly.
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zerosum

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i dont think its a scam.. seems pretty legit.. i may consider to develop their wordpress site. Time constraints are pretty tight though.
what seem legit to you?

The urgency to send money to someone?

The urgency to pay upfront by Friday and starting to look for funds on Wednesday?

The 2 times repeated nonsense statement - "We do not want to tie funds in bts for long period of time, but we are perfectly fine to kiss goodbye same funds and send them right away?" Cause this is the reason they do not want to short the bitUSD to themselves... tying up funds....but they are OK to send/spend same fund in USD... with a 5% premium never the less????

Offline Ander

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tsaishen, if you cannot acquire bitUSD right now with which to pay people, why waste 5% of your funds trying to pay them in bitUSD?  Why not pay in something else, like BTS, BTC, or fiat? 

I know that we want to use bitUSD, but if its not working right now because of the market matching bug, and youre going to have to pay a premium to do it, why not pay with something else?
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Offline jsidhu

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i dont think its a scam.. seems pretty legit.. i may consider to develop their wordpress site. Time constraints are pretty tight though.
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Offline clayop

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Here's an alternative to bitUSD. Why don't you use bitCNY temporarily? It now have a great liquidity, about $6,000 (1.4 mil BTS)
Bitshares Korea - http://www.bitshares.kr
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zerosum

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I was recently offered a job as community liaison by tsaishen, but I'm strongly recommending against this. Buying bitUSD for a premium is a huge waste of money.

1. If you have BTS, then you can create bitUSD by shorting bitUSD and then buying your own shorts. I'd expect you to have lots of BTS in reserve if you expected your activities to double the price of BTS.
2. If you don't have BTS, then you could offer your would-be employees BTC. I would accept that if I'd received that offer.
3. You could've offered to pay us would-be employees by Bank of America bank transfer, Western Union, Paypal instead of involving other forum members. Again, I would've accepted.

It's troubling that none of these ideas, which would've saved you money, hadn't occurred to you.
I'm going to reject your job offer for failure to satisfy my sole condition of acceptance.

To everyone else:
Do not send any money.

Please don't contact me again.

Thank you.
I agree. Stinks from a mile. Lot's of red flags for my liking!