Mt. Gox trustee outlines timeline for Bitcoin creditor claims ahead of $3 billion BTC payout

Former customers of defunct Japanese cryptocurrency trading platform Mt. Gox, which was affected in a 2011 hack, has two more weeks to submit its claims in a rehabilitation process, Mt wrote. Gox trustee to creditors on Wednesday.

Mt. Gox trustee Nobuaki Kobayashi, who is responsible for redistributing the stolen funds, set the beginning of a restriction period, during which he will stop accepting creditors’ claims, to September 15, 2022.

The limitation period ends when the deadline for basic payment is reached. The end of the restriction period will be set “in due course,” Kobayashi wrote.

BTC to US Dollar

In 2011, around 840,000 bitcoins (BTC) were stolen from Mt. Gox platform which at the height of its operations handled 70% of all BTC trading worldwide. Three years later, the company managed to recover about 140,000 BTC, and these coins have been locked in litigation ever since.

As the repayment process progresses to the next stage, Mt. Gox creditors be prohibited from assigning, transferring, succeeding their rehabilitation claims; submit their rehabilitation requirements as security, or dispose of these requirements in another way from 15 September.

After this date, Kobayashi will also “stop accepting applications for claim transfer procedures”.

As claimants move closer to being reimbursed, some suspect that the actual repayments may not be imminent.

“The trustee is not yet ready to pay out. There will be a KYC (know your customer) process, he will have to explain how payments will happen, etc., he will have to collect bank account data and so on,” a Mt. Gox creditor, Django Bits, wrote on Twitter.

“This will drag on for months if not years. Nothing the trustee does is quick,” he added.

Mt. Gox creditors plan to HODL

In recent weeks, some crypto traders and commentators have took to social media to express their fears that when Mt. Gox creditors receive their refunds, they may rush to sell their BTC, causing further selling pressure on the crypto king, which is currently trading below $20,000.

The total amount to be repaid – around 140,000 bitcoins – is now worth close to $3 billion.

But a recent poll conducted on Reddit suggests that these fears may be overblown. Most of Mt. Gox creditors do not plan to sell their refunded bitcoins, the survey showed. Fifty-six percent of creditors said they would not sell their coins.

Another 36% said they would sell their BTC for cash, and another 8% claimed they would exchange their returned bitcoins for other cryptocurrencies. A total of 486 creditors voted in the poll.

“I didn’t wait eight years to sell in a bear market,” commented one creditor.

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