(Charleston, SC) — Bitreserve, a company that describes itself as a revolutionary “new financial system”, has brought upon itself a world of potential legal exposure with its decision to take the trademarked name “Bitgold” from Nike Szabo, the suspected inventor of Bitcoin.
Mike Lorrey claims to have collaborated with Nick Szabo around 2005 on a digital currency called Bitgold. Many people within the bitcoin community have also speculated that Nick Szabo and Satoshi Nakamoto are the same individual. Mr. Lorrey has requested that Bitreserve cease and desist using the name coined by himself and Szabo over a decade ago.
The video embedded above is a promotional video for Bitreserve’s new gold backed product which they call “Bitgold”. There were a total of two comments posted below the video and then the owner disabled commenting.
Three Bitgolds
To make matters even more confusing, a new Canadian startup also calling itself BitGold has just closed a $3.5m Series A funding round and will be launching in February. This BitGold says its mission is to provide “global access to gold for secure savings and transactions”, while at the same time offering digital payments based on Bitcoin’s blockchain technology.
Similarly, Bitreserve’s product enables members to escape bitcoin volatility by holding bitcoin as physical gold, but still spend their money as bitcoin. Founded by Halsey Minor in 2013, Bitreserve is headquartered in Charleston, South Carolina and has operations in Braga, Shanghai and San Francisco, California.
Is the world big enough for three Bitgolds? Is Nick Szabo the real Satoshi Nakamoto? Log in below using your favorite social network to weigh in on the discussion.