Announcing the Cyberland Equities Exchange!

I think sometimes you have to take a risk. Theres always going to be bad eggs out there, Enrons, Parmalats, Worldcom etc.... but theres also going to be some gems.

Just to give you some background, I don't really play Second Life much. Too be honest the original reason why I got an account was to day trade on GOM. But I've been slowly accruing L$ on the account and have fiddled about with a bits and pieces. Recently been interested by all these startup investment ideas, so going to be a bit more active in terms of dabbling in the various concepts.

So things like Ginko and things like this exhange I'm interested in giving a go. Some may be scams, some may not. But well I don't have much to lose. Too be honest the amounts in question are paltry to some of the amounts I invest with in other virtual environments.

I dont think its a scam either blaze, but beneath all the long drawn out attacks, he/she has a point about anominity. I think perhaps the reason Smiley is so upset is that this "investment business" does totally violates the cardinal rule of investing.

If Shaun is as capable with these sorts of financial things as he/she seems to be, they must know this also. I question someone who is positioning themselves as a financial expert and yet violates this very basic ground rule. I mean *everyone* knows about getting security or accountability for investments. I am a anti-capitalist/socialist and *I* know that even.

While Smiley is also upset about a lot of other things, this one central point is worth hammering home again and again. Without that trust, this business has a "road out ahead" sign staring at it. It may initialy take off, but I would guess not for long.

Anyone who gives their money to an anonymous company run by an anonymous person is just .. well the biggest chump in the universe.

I would also really, really, like any Lindens that may be reading this thread to consider outlawing any kind of "SL Stockmarkets," as there is no way they can be beneficial IMO. Just look at RL, the only benefit is for a few rich investors to suck money out of the economy while driving up prices. Do we really need that sort of crap?

What value does this add to the SL economy? Nothing that I can see.

Edit: It seems that the "Domain by Proxy" place will release your RL name and address at the drop of a hat anyway for anyone of a bout fifty blanket reasons, so Sean is not as anoymnous as may be apparent.

Reading between the lines it seems they might even regularly share their database with the authorities, at least that is my interpretation. I would not recommend anyone with anythig serious to hide join that service.

Here here.



I agree in outlawing any kind of "SL Anonymous StockMarkets" - yes.

Private corporations comprised of individuals who are splitting revenue based on share ownership is a fine idea.

Also, Merwan had a good idea about connecting a username to a credit card which could be a solution as well to this problem.

However, I do agree with the rest of your summary.

For the moment though, I think we just have to hit the point home again after again so that when people are defrauded they don't blame the system and simply blame their own 'chumpness'.

I also think there might be room for someone to provide an escrow accounting service as well. This wouldn't work in all situations, because people don't want to reveal their biz models, even to an escrow service.

Kind of like the "KPMG" of SecondLife.

Hi blaze,



I can assure you that this isn't the case. Of course I'd have to violate the privacy of investors to DOCUMENT that statement, so I guess we're right back where we started with only my word to say this is real people who are really trading. I guess you have to just take that for what it's worth. Speaking broadly though, the exchange is already the exchange is already holding around L$200,000 belonging to residents who are trading. (not company income from the IPO, just residents who are trading stock).




I'd sign up for this, again as long as it's only reducing my own level of privacy and not that of residents using my site. A public accounting of who did what and when with respect to the actual stock trades wouldn't be fair.. I think that people should have the right to trade anonymously.

As far as an overall broader view of MY SIDE as far as what went into my ATMs, what went out, what land I've bought in-world, what auctions I've won, etc.. I'd definately be on board with that. I'd probably be a lot more comfortable listing other companies if they had to also stipulate to something like this.



-Shaun

I agree with this, and I'm taking on this project with a deep sense of responsibility to the investors. Even in the unlikely event of a Cyberland crash, I WILL redeem the shares for equivelant land or cash at face value. Afterall that land and money does belong to the share holders. This of course doesn't mean that nobody will lose money, but it is something. Afterall that land and money does belong to the share holders.

As far as personal information though, I'm just not willing to go there. I stand by my above statement that LL can feel free to pass my info out to anyone in the event that something that will never happen does. In general though, I just don't want some nutcase calling me up at 2am, or worse, stopping by with an axe, if the stock value drops an L$.



Shaun

blaze,

You know, I hadn't even thought about really small scale stock issues, private stock issues etc. This is a really good idea!

maybe not the legal definition, but it's is maligning shaun and cyberlands reputation with unfustified accusation. and not very good for your own credibility for more critical readers.

Agree.



Here's where you kind of lost me. I agree in principle, but I believe the reality to be somewhat different. I think that even if a less than reputable person was at the helm of one of these ventures, fraud just wouldn't make sense. I mean let's look at a publicly held investment land company for example (seems like a pretty relivant example). Once it gets large, it would be VERY hard to unload that much land, fast enough for nobody to notice, and still get any large amount of money out of it. So now, we're left to evaluate the only target that would be left, the cash reserve.

What's the most that we can reasonably expect to be there at any one point in time? 20k USD? What could one even do with that, which would make it worth giving up all of the earnings potential that will CONTINUE to exist as SL continues to grow, every day, towards it's target of a million users?

You could buy 1/3 of a decent car. You could make a decent downpayment on a really small house. Ok, I guess you could take a pretty awesome vacation!

Bottom line, it seems to me that the money to be made from perpetrating such a fraud is small change in comparison to the money to be made from honest dealings in large enterprise as SL continues to grow. One would have to be not only a criminal, and a loser, but just plain silly to consider something like this. I doubt anyone with all of these traits, who is so short sighted, would be able to inspire much confidence in investors in the first place.

This is all just my take though and I don't present it as a fact about every type of investment opportunity out there.



Like I said, in the case of SL, it seems to me that the money one doesn't honestly earn tomorrow would spend a lot better than the money one could steal today.



-Shaun

Hehe

I dont think I know enough about financial stuff to comment on that.

I do know that taking value out of an economy and adding no product or service in return is a bad idea and a lot of investment schemes are targeted to do precisely that.

By product or service I mean something beyond just the capitalist platitudes about "growing the economy" or the idea that the the massive profits being skimmed off the top will "trickle down" to regular folks.

As Rocky said to Bullwinkle:

"Again? That trick never works."

This is not the case here. What SL land investment entails, in a nutshell, is taking on some of the influx of land activated by LL, or that residents no longer want and need to unload quickly, holding that land until it finds a new home, and then selling it for a profit. SL investment land companies provide both product and service.



It's not an idea in this case, it's a reality. The company that I manage offers dividend returns to it's share holders, based on gross revenue and posted weekly when the criteria are met. Of course money can also be made (or lost) through trading shares on the open market with a goal of buying low and selling high. The value of stock is for the market to decide though, not me.



-Shaun

Well, you're talking about land specifically. If you could give me an accounting of all your land, absolutely, because you are securitizing your investment via land. You can't 'cash out' very easily and so that'd be cool.

However, one still has to wonder if LL would necessarily step in if your started to sell your land without renumerating shareholders. Theoretically, they would, however I haven't seen anything in the TOS that says they would or that they'd be set up for this.

That being said - Shaun, is there a list of your land holdings we can look at?

It would be nice if they would. I'd be happy to sign a waiver similar to the one I mentioned a page or two ago, stating that this would also be ok. I doubt if they have the resources to monitor a resident operated stock exchange though.

What would REALLY be ideal is a more robust group administration toolset. When it's possible to keep the assets safe (eliminate recalls, control where sales revenue goes etc) I'd really like to be able to invite anyone into the actual land group as a member. This way anyone who's curious can just look through the data straight out of LL's accouting and see that what's on the site is in fact what really transpired.

I can't speak for other companies that I may list on the exchange, but I'd definately do this if it made sense as a safe thing to do. Perhaps I could also make this a listing requirement, but saying "I won't let you IPO here unless you agree to this" doesn't hold a lot of weight once the shares are sold. My only recourse if someone went back on this agreement would be to suspend trading in their company, and that could get really ugly.

There are no easy answers to some of these questions. What I can say for sure is that we will continue to ponder them openly, as a group, and at the end of the day I will weigh all of the options in a scenerio and do what I believe is in the best interest of the exchange.



-Shaun

What I said about groups above applies here too. I'm also whipping up tools right now to enable me to understand all aspects of the business at a glance. It should be possible to have some (or maybe even all) of that data available from a market page. This would also be nice because it would allow investors to see exactly what I'm up to in a less broad sense than what's currently available.

It doesn't really scale well to companies who's business isn't primarially based on land, though, if such companies are ever listed. I'm not sure how much sense it would make to investors if more information were available on some companies than others.

This all requires a lot of thought, and will take some time, even if I decide to put it up there. In the mean time though, what you CAN do, is pull up the group "Cyberland B" in my profile and click the members tab to see the tier alocated to the group. It would be a rather silly thing for me to alocate and pay for tier to hold non-existant land. Also, when you're cruising the grid, anywhere you see the metal/blue Cyberland signs, that's your land (assuming you're a shareholder ).



-Shaun

Well, what group do you have the land holdings under? I have access to a scanner which can ferret it out.

Is it Cyberland, Cyberland B, and Cyberland rentals?

Cyberland B is the only one holding land associated with the market.

Looking at this thread after sometime, it seems to be an interesting idea. But I believe alot more information needs to be available to the investor.

Right now it seems this financial endevour is based on alot of good faith or possibly hype. In RL much more information can be aquired to check out credentials. These are some questions I would like to be addressed:

1) Who decides on purchases of land? What is this person's experience or credentials?
2) What percentange of land is PG or Mature? What tactics are used to purchase them?
3) Who are the top 10 shareholders and what percentage do they own? Example: How many shares does Shaun own?

Hi Toneless,

Thank you for your questions. I will do my best to fill you in.



Any stock trade is based on good faith. You make your buys and sales based on how you feel about where the company is headed. Whenever I have something of importance to say, I will put a press release out on the web site. In time when other SL companies are listed on the exchange they will of course do the same.

There are risks involved with any investment, but this one has the unique advantage of being backed by land and money. This means that even in the extremely unlikely event of the company going bankrupt, it still won't be a total wipe-out for the share holders. If this were to actually occur, all shares would be redeemable for their equivelant amount of land, or in the event that land isn't desired, cash at liquidation value.



I do. I've been trading land in Second Life successfully under the name Cyberland for quite a while. The group held just under 2 sims at it's peak, prior to a halt in buying in order to liquidate the inventory at full value around the time the new continent was announced.

I'm confident in my ability to produce dividend returns for the share holders, but prior to making any buy and hold type decisions in the market, you should be confident with this as well. I understand that the company data hasn't been public for very long now, and encourage you to wait on the sidelines and monitor this data for as long as it takes for you to be comfortable. Feel free to IM me in-world and ask me questions, by the way. As long as I'm not too busy I'm happy to sit down and discuss these things with people.



Overall, I'm not a huge fan of PG land unless the margins are great. Currently the ratio is about 5:1 in favor of mature, and I'd like to maintain that for the forseeable future, or maybe even increase it a little. That said, if a really stellar PG buy presents itself while we're on ratio, I'll buy it. I'm not going to let the 5:1 number get in the way of revenue, but it is a general guideline that I'd like to follow unless unusual circumstances dictate otherwise.

It's probably a good idea to put out a press release regarding this ratio. I'll get on that soon.



I'm not going to release private share holder data on the other 9, but I will share this data for myself. I currently own just over 50% of the shares outstanding. In addition, I will continue to buy using my own money to maintain this percentage as new shares are offered, assuming that they don't all get snatched up before I can click off a few buy orders.

I don't trade my shares in any appreciable volume, however, I only buy them and hold them. If I ever elected to sell a lot of them I would of course post an announcement a week in advance. Why do I have these shares if I'm not trading them?

For an endeavour like this to work in SL, at least at this point, I feel that one person needs to have veto decision making power. I'm not comfortable with having that authority over the direction of the company without also personally having a major vested interest in it's future.



-Shaun

Just to let people know, I went out and scanned a number of sims that Shaun gave me for ownership by Cyberland B and he does own the land he speaks of.

While I personally feel that Shaun is a very honest person, I don't think anyone would trust me. Shaun could be my ALT for all you know and I could have fabricated this entire thread.

Ideally, there would be an auditing process in place or some kind of transparency. Right now it's all based on trust, which I'm not a huge fan of.

I've done my best to make this as transparent as I can for the time being. Like I've said above, as far as Cyberland goes I'm not going to give anyone a hard sell on why you should trust me to run your company. That decision is up to each of you. I'm just going to let the numbers continue to speak for themselves, and encourage anyone with reservations to continue to wait on the sidelines and watch those numbers.

If a time comes when you're ready, I'm sure there will still be shares on the market at some price. Maybe lower than today or maybe higher.. that's mostly for the open market to decide.



-Shaun

Something to think about:

Since this is a public company, when is the first shareholder election going to take place? Shaun, do you have any fear of losing your position at the head of the company when this happens?

No I'm not too worried about this, as I've purchased over 50% of the shares in circulation using my own money, and fully intend to continue doing so. I'll continue posting investor meetings in the events under the name "Second Life's Stock Exhange" though. Prospective investors are invited to come and ask questions. Current investors are also welcome to come and discuss any concerns they have about how I'm operating the company, and I'll gladly listen.



-Shaun

Perhaps it might be an idea part of the website to also display a map showing the land for sale? Or at least some kind of real time list that updates as you buy and sell land.

Would you also release some kind of financial accounts for us to peruse. At least for those who are more accounting minded.

The other question I have is that as the largest shareholder will you post some kind of stock exchange annoucements every time you either buy or sell shares. I think in RL Stock Exchanges like the London Stock Exchange, directors or large shareholders (those that own more then 3% of the stock) have to post official annoucements if their share holdings substantially change.

ok, well I just bought 50 shares