Adam Back won't answer questions about a convicted felon, the missing Bitcoin, or the 20% yields promised to investors. Behind the scenes look at what collapsed the SPAC and Greg Maxwell's role.
Adam Back's Blockstream and Christopher William Cook's Exacore are Potemkin companies that exist solely to raise investor funds based on lies of unrealistic profits, in my opinion. You state that "maybe there are some facts here"; are you incapable of reading, Tom? The CEO of the company you're saying I defamed is a convicted fraudster who constantly skips out on bills to people he owes money to (so much so that he's been sued numerous times). Most recently, he paid $70,000 for artwork he bought, had the art delivered to his home, then reversed the AMEX payment. Running up debts and not paying is the same activity he went to prison for as well! None of this was disclosed to the investors funding what I believe is one of the largest fraudulent Ponzi schemes that has ever existed, where everyone from the CEO on down is LARPing as people they are not, with fawning media amplifying the harm to investors.
Based on months of research into "the ordinary people who rely on this work experience" at Exacore, the company you are defending hires people with no experience and little education, with several Exacore employees formerly working at Walmart in packaging roles, as substitute teachers, and in other totally irrelevant lines of work! I can understand where you're coming from, but I'd strongly urge you to assess the facts objectively.
The fact that you’re complaining about employees being tainted by association with Exacore is very telling. It would lead one to reach the same conclusion that Exacore hires people with no qualifications for jobs that they may not need to actually do. And you’re mad that that fiction is being dashed.
There are investors who have put their life savings into Blockstream Mining Note investment products…
I think you're hurt by the fact that I am calling out people who are LARPing. I have spoken to people who worked at Exacore; most of the work done was "no-show" type jobs they were hired to role-play at and not do anything real - I believe.
Your first article claims no mines exist, and it's all fake. But there are obviously Exacore mines. For example by the substation south of Orange Grove on 359. Real hard-working Texans built and run this.
Now you're doubling down to defame the the people who built and run these mines as people "with no experience and little education", "no qualifications for jobs", who are "LARPing as people they are not."
I can read because I have eyes that can see. And anyone with eyes can go see the mines for themselves. If you're confused, come to Texas rather than defaming the people who live here as uneducated hicks who couldn't possibly have built anything.
I don't know much about finance or investments, but I stick by my statement that maybe some of what you said about those things is true, or maybe it's not. If you help some investors to not get scammed, then that sounds good to me. But you're also trying to convince me things I've seen with my own eyes don't exist. So perhaps you can understand my skepticism.
Tom, you're lying! My first investigation says the Bitcoin mines do not exist at the scale to pay off the billions of dollars of Bitcoin that's owed to investors who have put money into the Blockstream Mining Note (BMN) investment product.
You claim to be able to read. If you can in fact read, then you're lying and being deceitful!
Arguing about the silly shell games of whether it's an Exacore mine or a Blockstream mine seems absolutely pointless. You seem to know a lot about the Bitcoin mining being done by Exacore, can you honestly state that Exacore or Blockstream actually have 26 EH/s plus of mining capacity? Or anywhere near that? Does Exacore even have the 15 EH/s that the dashboard says it does? If you were honest, you'd be able to answer this question. And...
1. How many ASICs did Exacore have running at peak?
2. What make and model of ASICs were they?
3. What was the power usage?
4. Did Exacore curtail during peak demand times based on ERCOT demand scheduling?
5. Can the majority of Exacore Mining employees get hired elsewhere at a Bitcoin miner like Hut 8 or RIOT Platforms?
6. Which pool is the hashrate directed at? We know it's not Braiins' because Braiins' total pool is smaller than Exacore/Blockstream's claimed hashrate.
Instead of making vague insinuations, let's talk facts *based on what you saw with your own eyes*.
I believe your anger is based on Exacore/Blockstream seemingly hiring a bunch of uneducated, ill-suited people for jobs they were not qualified to do, and they put Exacore on their CVs, and now you're worried that once the gig is up, they won't get to claim that on their CVs. Your fear is very well founded, because in your heart of hearts you know all the facts I've laid out in Part 1 and Part 2 are true.
You seem to care far more about employees who got jobs they were unqualified for and got paid to seemingly do "no-show jobs" that paid well, rather than caring about the investors who have sunk billions of dollars. This is noted.
NATINFOSEC: """"Tom, you're lying! My first investigation says the Bitcoin mines do not exist at the scale to pay off the billions of dollars of Bitcoin that's owed to investors who have put money into the Blockstream Mining Note (BMN) investment product."""""
If that's what your first investigation allegedly says, why do you respond to the comments by saying explicitly: """It cannot explain there not being any Bitcoin mines! """ ?
I went back and reviewed the investigation before responding to your comment. Taken in whole, including comments, it seemed clear to me you want the audience reading that article to believe there's actually no Exacore mines.
NATINFOSEC: """Exacore/Blockstream hired a bunch of uneducated, ill-suited people for jobs they were not qualified to do""""
It's my view that's more defamation.
I guess I read well enough to both see how you say something but wiggle just enough to add plausible deniability and also apply the skills I observed to my own writing.
NATINFOSEC: """"You seem to know a lot about the Bitcoin mining being done by Exacore, [...] Instead of making vague insinuations, let's talk facts *based on what you saw with your own eyes*."""
You asked that other person who commented: """how is Blockstream mining Bitcoin without visible mines?""". I told you specifically where a mine is visible, something you were apparently interested in two days ago. But now you seem uninterested in the answer to your own question. """This is noted.""""
NATINFOSEC: ***QUESTIONS***
Does anyone honestly need to answer all of those questions to reject your grandiose statement that the mining operation """(NATINFOSEC:) I believe is one of the largest fraudulent Ponzi schemes that has ever existed""""?
In what world is the question: """Did Exacore curtail during peak demand times based on ERCOT demand scheduling?"""" relevant to rejecting your highfalutin claim that there is LITTLE OR NO legitimate earnings?
Like I said earlier, I'm not an investment or finance guy. I can't tell anyone if Exacore is a good investment or not. But in Texas, people know the many Exacore mining locations generating significant legitimate bitcoin exist. I even verified my personal knowledge by providing physical directions to a mine.
That's a load of bull you think defending people against accusations they didn't show up, build, or operate real mining operations somehow means I'm unconcerned about the investors.
Can you admit you lied and that I never wrote what you say I wrote?
You've not presented 1 valid rebuttal. You've just used ChatGPT to generate idiotic responses and pasted them into the comment box (the formatting you've used is a dead giveaway of lazy ChatGPT copy pasting also I doubt "grandiose" is a word that's actually in your vocabulary).
> "it seemed clear to me you want the audience reading that article to believe there's actually no Exacore mines."
So you actually know how to read minds?
> "But in Texas, people know the many Exacore mining locations generating significant legitimate bitcoin exist. I even verified my personal knowledge by providing physical directions to a mine."
Categorically false.
> " relevant to rejecting your highfalutin claim that there is LITTLE OR NO legitimate earnings?"
So, according to you, if Exacore/Blockstream has 1 EH/s when they owe 24-plus EH/s of hashrate to investors, Exacore/Blockstream can't be running a Ponzi scheme? You're incredibly illogical!
Speaking of Ponzi schemes (which you brought up) Charles Ponzi actually bought postal reply coupons. That was a real thing he did. He just didn't buy anywhere near enough to cover what he owed investors, so the gap got filled with new money. Madoff ran a real, legitimate market-making business for decades, one of the largest on Wall Street.
> " I'm not an investment or finance guy. I can't tell anyone if Exacore is a good investment or not. "
Then you should not be commenting here posting nonsense that ChatGPT generated for you.
I want to apologize for what I said earlier. When my comment said I was suspended, and you said "Nice shiny new Wordpress website" I thought you were insulting me because I am new to Substack. I thought that "word press" meant my account here. But I realized why you said "Wordpress" now...
it's because this site I linked that "alleges" to list Andy Back's mines is a Word Press: https://www.exacore.com/sites . Duuuuuuuuhhhh.
I also realized you misunderstood where I was coming from if you think I work with the island people. LOL I don't work for them or make their website. that was confusing me too.
I like your article. It's very good. I don't remember what my original post said, but I was asking about this because I saw your article on X and I was going to say how ALL Andy's mines are ALL props like in a movie. but you only mentioned one mine. So I wanted to make sure I had a source before I said that.
Since I didn't understand, I thought you were suspending me and making fun of my account because I called him "Andy". then i thought, you were one of the island people that still calls him "Adam" in your article.
but now I realize I misunderstood, and I'm really sorry I thought you were one of them. obviously you're not!!!
I hope TOM comes back to give us more information to make fun of!!! anyway I am sorry this is my last post here. cheers.
Nice try! Yes, firmly believe the Bitcoin mining does not exist at scale to support the BMN investments being offered to investors by Adam Back and Blockstream. But don't worry wait for Part 3... It's coming soon.
Maybe there's some facts here. Maybe there's not.
The first article is defamatory to the dozens of everyday rank-and-file who actually built and run the Exacore mines.
Calling the mines fake harms the ordinary people who rely on this work experience on their resume for future employment.
Especially relevant if you succeed in your campaign to collapse their employer.
Adam Back's Blockstream and Christopher William Cook's Exacore are Potemkin companies that exist solely to raise investor funds based on lies of unrealistic profits, in my opinion. You state that "maybe there are some facts here"; are you incapable of reading, Tom? The CEO of the company you're saying I defamed is a convicted fraudster who constantly skips out on bills to people he owes money to (so much so that he's been sued numerous times). Most recently, he paid $70,000 for artwork he bought, had the art delivered to his home, then reversed the AMEX payment. Running up debts and not paying is the same activity he went to prison for as well! None of this was disclosed to the investors funding what I believe is one of the largest fraudulent Ponzi schemes that has ever existed, where everyone from the CEO on down is LARPing as people they are not, with fawning media amplifying the harm to investors.
Based on months of research into "the ordinary people who rely on this work experience" at Exacore, the company you are defending hires people with no experience and little education, with several Exacore employees formerly working at Walmart in packaging roles, as substitute teachers, and in other totally irrelevant lines of work! I can understand where you're coming from, but I'd strongly urge you to assess the facts objectively.
The fact that you’re complaining about employees being tainted by association with Exacore is very telling. It would lead one to reach the same conclusion that Exacore hires people with no qualifications for jobs that they may not need to actually do. And you’re mad that that fiction is being dashed.
There are investors who have put their life savings into Blockstream Mining Note investment products…
I think you're hurt by the fact that I am calling out people who are LARPing. I have spoken to people who worked at Exacore; most of the work done was "no-show" type jobs they were hired to role-play at and not do anything real - I believe.
Just wait for Part 3. You ain't seen nothing yet.
Your first article claims no mines exist, and it's all fake. But there are obviously Exacore mines. For example by the substation south of Orange Grove on 359. Real hard-working Texans built and run this.
Now you're doubling down to defame the the people who built and run these mines as people "with no experience and little education", "no qualifications for jobs", who are "LARPing as people they are not."
I can read because I have eyes that can see. And anyone with eyes can go see the mines for themselves. If you're confused, come to Texas rather than defaming the people who live here as uneducated hicks who couldn't possibly have built anything.
I don't know much about finance or investments, but I stick by my statement that maybe some of what you said about those things is true, or maybe it's not. If you help some investors to not get scammed, then that sounds good to me. But you're also trying to convince me things I've seen with my own eyes don't exist. So perhaps you can understand my skepticism.
Tom, you're lying! My first investigation says the Bitcoin mines do not exist at the scale to pay off the billions of dollars of Bitcoin that's owed to investors who have put money into the Blockstream Mining Note (BMN) investment product.
You claim to be able to read. If you can in fact read, then you're lying and being deceitful!
Arguing about the silly shell games of whether it's an Exacore mine or a Blockstream mine seems absolutely pointless. You seem to know a lot about the Bitcoin mining being done by Exacore, can you honestly state that Exacore or Blockstream actually have 26 EH/s plus of mining capacity? Or anywhere near that? Does Exacore even have the 15 EH/s that the dashboard says it does? If you were honest, you'd be able to answer this question. And...
1. How many ASICs did Exacore have running at peak?
2. What make and model of ASICs were they?
3. What was the power usage?
4. Did Exacore curtail during peak demand times based on ERCOT demand scheduling?
5. Can the majority of Exacore Mining employees get hired elsewhere at a Bitcoin miner like Hut 8 or RIOT Platforms?
6. Which pool is the hashrate directed at? We know it's not Braiins' because Braiins' total pool is smaller than Exacore/Blockstream's claimed hashrate.
Instead of making vague insinuations, let's talk facts *based on what you saw with your own eyes*.
I believe your anger is based on Exacore/Blockstream seemingly hiring a bunch of uneducated, ill-suited people for jobs they were not qualified to do, and they put Exacore on their CVs, and now you're worried that once the gig is up, they won't get to claim that on their CVs. Your fear is very well founded, because in your heart of hearts you know all the facts I've laid out in Part 1 and Part 2 are true.
You seem to care far more about employees who got jobs they were unqualified for and got paid to seemingly do "no-show jobs" that paid well, rather than caring about the investors who have sunk billions of dollars. This is noted.
NATINFOSEC: """"Tom, you're lying! My first investigation says the Bitcoin mines do not exist at the scale to pay off the billions of dollars of Bitcoin that's owed to investors who have put money into the Blockstream Mining Note (BMN) investment product."""""
If that's what your first investigation allegedly says, why do you respond to the comments by saying explicitly: """It cannot explain there not being any Bitcoin mines! """ ?
I went back and reviewed the investigation before responding to your comment. Taken in whole, including comments, it seemed clear to me you want the audience reading that article to believe there's actually no Exacore mines.
NATINFOSEC: """Exacore/Blockstream hired a bunch of uneducated, ill-suited people for jobs they were not qualified to do""""
It's my view that's more defamation.
I guess I read well enough to both see how you say something but wiggle just enough to add plausible deniability and also apply the skills I observed to my own writing.
NATINFOSEC: """"You seem to know a lot about the Bitcoin mining being done by Exacore, [...] Instead of making vague insinuations, let's talk facts *based on what you saw with your own eyes*."""
You asked that other person who commented: """how is Blockstream mining Bitcoin without visible mines?""". I told you specifically where a mine is visible, something you were apparently interested in two days ago. But now you seem uninterested in the answer to your own question. """This is noted.""""
NATINFOSEC: ***QUESTIONS***
Does anyone honestly need to answer all of those questions to reject your grandiose statement that the mining operation """(NATINFOSEC:) I believe is one of the largest fraudulent Ponzi schemes that has ever existed""""?
SEC says: """With LITTLE OR NO legitimate earnings, Ponzi schemes require a constant flow of new money to survive.""" https://www.investor.gov/protect-your-investments/fraud/types-fraud/ponzi-scheme Emphasis mine.
In what world is the question: """Did Exacore curtail during peak demand times based on ERCOT demand scheduling?"""" relevant to rejecting your highfalutin claim that there is LITTLE OR NO legitimate earnings?
Like I said earlier, I'm not an investment or finance guy. I can't tell anyone if Exacore is a good investment or not. But in Texas, people know the many Exacore mining locations generating significant legitimate bitcoin exist. I even verified my personal knowledge by providing physical directions to a mine.
That's a load of bull you think defending people against accusations they didn't show up, build, or operate real mining operations somehow means I'm unconcerned about the investors.
So no. I am not """lying""". Bless your heart.
Can you admit you lied and that I never wrote what you say I wrote?
You've not presented 1 valid rebuttal. You've just used ChatGPT to generate idiotic responses and pasted them into the comment box (the formatting you've used is a dead giveaway of lazy ChatGPT copy pasting also I doubt "grandiose" is a word that's actually in your vocabulary).
> "it seemed clear to me you want the audience reading that article to believe there's actually no Exacore mines."
So you actually know how to read minds?
> "But in Texas, people know the many Exacore mining locations generating significant legitimate bitcoin exist. I even verified my personal knowledge by providing physical directions to a mine."
Categorically false.
> " relevant to rejecting your highfalutin claim that there is LITTLE OR NO legitimate earnings?"
So, according to you, if Exacore/Blockstream has 1 EH/s when they owe 24-plus EH/s of hashrate to investors, Exacore/Blockstream can't be running a Ponzi scheme? You're incredibly illogical!
Speaking of Ponzi schemes (which you brought up) Charles Ponzi actually bought postal reply coupons. That was a real thing he did. He just didn't buy anywhere near enough to cover what he owed investors, so the gap got filled with new money. Madoff ran a real, legitimate market-making business for decades, one of the largest on Wall Street.
> " I'm not an investment or finance guy. I can't tell anyone if Exacore is a good investment or not. "
Then you should not be commenting here posting nonsense that ChatGPT generated for you.
I want to apologize for what I said earlier. When my comment said I was suspended, and you said "Nice shiny new Wordpress website" I thought you were insulting me because I am new to Substack. I thought that "word press" meant my account here. But I realized why you said "Wordpress" now...
it's because this site I linked that "alleges" to list Andy Back's mines is a Word Press: https://www.exacore.com/sites . Duuuuuuuuhhhh.
I also realized you misunderstood where I was coming from if you think I work with the island people. LOL I don't work for them or make their website. that was confusing me too.
I like your article. It's very good. I don't remember what my original post said, but I was asking about this because I saw your article on X and I was going to say how ALL Andy's mines are ALL props like in a movie. but you only mentioned one mine. So I wanted to make sure I had a source before I said that.
Since I didn't understand, I thought you were suspending me and making fun of my account because I called him "Andy". then i thought, you were one of the island people that still calls him "Adam" in your article.
but now I realize I misunderstood, and I'm really sorry I thought you were one of them. obviously you're not!!!
I hope TOM comes back to give us more information to make fun of!!! anyway I am sorry this is my last post here. cheers.
Nice try! Yes, firmly believe the Bitcoin mining does not exist at scale to support the BMN investments being offered to investors by Adam Back and Blockstream. But don't worry wait for Part 3... It's coming soon.
The best is yet to come!