Hello Everyone, Jim (of cambist fame) and I were discussing the idea about a year ago and at the time my main concerns were to find a small enough government that I could convince to let me write their Securities and Exchange act for them.
Some Island nations came up, but nobody had the infrastructure and we didn't have the financial backers to put one in place. Of course, Sealand didn't even come up in the discussion. I'm extremely excited that someone is now doing what should have been done pretty much right away when e-gold started to find a wider audience. However, I feel that there is an item or two that 'must' be considered if this venture is to be more than a marketing gimmick for TGC, Sealand and possibly a handfull others. And before I'm branded as a naysayer or something, those of you that 'know' me, know that I'm somewhat qualified to raise these concerns: [1] The bourse needs a trading system / clearing facility [and charge fees to finance it]. Mere OTC trading will never allow the idea to grow beyond a few dozen punters who are mainly speculating - or gambling. [2] The bourse needs to be 'owned'. Only if there are people with a vested interest in the smooth functioning of everything will there be some safety device to protect small investors. Without that there is either no environment for growth beyond a few companies - or there is a wild west atmosphere that could threaten the very existence of Sealand as an independent nation. The item here being that if some culprits use the new market for large scale fraud [and you *never* know what's inside a person's head till afterwards] and nobody being able to do anything about it, then some shifty lawers will go after the ISPs as the people that made it possible. Even if they do loose, it's likely that they will open the whole case with a salvo of injunctions to get the plug pulled while the case is pending. Clear rules of listing - which still has to be open to everyone within those rules - will create a frame work that avoids the plug-pulling. That said, I'm interested in buying shares in the bourse ;o) [3] The bourse needs to decide on a base currency [e-gold I presume] to avoid varying exchange rates between different gold currencies. This will not shut out the others, but it will make te design of the trading system much easier. Unless clearing is done manually - for which we could offer the services of low priced staff in Malaysia, by the way. [4] Independently from the value of the shares, which the market will decide itself through trades, bids and asks, etc. there needs to be a way to value the actual company that issues the shares and so limit the amount of shares it can issue. I know this sounds less exciting, but without it we don't have a bourse but an offshore loan office that trades zero warrants [linggo: new word, zero coupon meets share warrant, a paper that bears no fixed interest and is exchangable for a share in case of default by which time the actual value of the share is indeterminible and traded in pure buyer's market at any price possible - if that]. The risk here being that the share holders have nothing of value to put a claim up against. TGC *does* have several things of value, such as their software, goodwill, etc. Hence, there is something share holders can claim in case of default - but only if there are rules that make it claimable, and place a value on it to start with. Obviously this is a somewhat brief overview but I don't want to bore everyone to death. In any case, I find it very exciting and will certainly look into trading on the new bourse :o) Cheers, Robert. budget & privacy website hosting http://www.cyberica.net budget & privacy domain registrations http://www.u2planet.com --- You are currently subscribed to e-gold-list as: [EMAIL PROTECTED] To unsubscribe send a blank email to [EMAIL PROTECTED] Use e-gold's Secure Randomized Keyboard (SRK) when accessing your e-gold account(s) via the web and shopping cart interfaces to help thwart keystroke loggers and common viruses.
