Mt. Gox trustee postpones deadline for filing civil rehabilitation

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The trustee of defunct cryptocurrency exchange Mt. Gox has extended the deadline for filing civil rehabilitation plans, in what looks set to deliver yet another delay for those still awaiting redress.

Nobuaki Kobayashi, who was appointed to oversee the handling of compensation claims against the company, announced in a post on the Mt. Gox website that he had applied to a court in Tokyo to revise the deadline for filing.

Kobayashi had been expected to file details of its civil rehabilitation plans with courts this week, having announced the deadline in March.

After receiving court approval for the extension, the deadline has now been extended from April 26 to October 31. According to the notice on the firm’s website updating stakeholders on developments, the move is the result of a need for more time in light of the high volume of rejected claims.

The April deadline was submitted after the trustee said he had finalized approvals for claims against the firm, pledging to notify claimants over the coming weeks.

However, according to a notice on the website, the trustee is still dealing with “a large amount of rehabilitation claims” that had been rejected, although may still be considered as part of a broader “claim assessment procedure.”

It stated, “Accordingly, it is not possible at this moment to make appropriate provisions in a rehabilitation plan on modifications of the rights of the rehabilitation claims, repayment methods, and appropriate measures for the undetermined rehabilitation claims and therefore to submit a rehabilitation plan by April 26, 2019.”

Ultimately, the courts in Tokyo will rule on each of the claims, in a process that is expected to be painstaking.

The news of the extension is the latest blow to those still awaiting redress from the firm, including a large number of former customers still waiting to recover funds from the exchange.

The collapsed exchange, once the world’s largest forum for buying and selling Bitcoin, sent shockwaves throughout the cryptocurrency industry when it fell after it was spectacularly hacked by BTC scammers.

Those still awaiting justice now have no option but to wait several more months to see whether or not the exchange will honor their claims.