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Kolin Burges, a Mt. Gox customer, holds a placard while protesting outside a building housing the headquarters of Mt. Gox in Tokyo, Japan.Kiyoshi Ota/Bloomberg/Getty Images
The implosion of one of the largest Bitcoin exchanges on Tuesday sparked an online conversation about the future of the digital currency and the lessons learned by its enthusiasts.
The website of Tokyo-based exchange Mt. Gox went blank, prompting rumors that it had become insolvent. A leaked "crisis strategy" document emerged, allegedly from Mt. Gox, detailing losses and theft of more than 744,000 bitcoins. Price volatility makes an exact dollar conversion difficult, but some estimated the loss to be hundreds of millions of dollars.
Other major Bitcoin exchanges and companies issued a joint statement, painting the situation as an isolated incident of mismanagement. Many observers, however, said the Mt. Gox collapse could spell long-term trouble or even the end of Bitcoin.
Within hours of Mt. Gox ceasing all trades, the price of Bitcoin dropped dramatically, causing many investors to lose large sums.
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