Help Wanted TopsEx offering 7.5% on Gold Warrants

[RHANDP]

@ALL ...

Currently assisting a local currency aimed at a sleepy Devon village ... £T ... The Topsham Pound.

The information below is directly from their FAQ.

They are looking for partners and investors willing to assign their metals, which would never leave their current warehouse, and would be used, in effect, to place "risk free" bets AGAINST client members ability to repay finance or loans on time, if at all... read the FAQ below to see how that works!

They have been known to pay 7%+ p/a to lenders, which is the same rate offered to local traders while payment of their positive account balances in hard currency or ingots is made.

P.M. me (RHANDP) here at FPA to find out more, to volunteer your metals, or to chat!


PLEASE NOTE ...
THIS SERVICE IS CURRENTLY IN "PRE LAUNCH" PHASE.
THERE IS ALMOST NO TAKEUP IN TOPSHAM ITSELF.
FEEL FREE TO POST IDEAS AND OBSERVATIONS. WHAT HAVE WE MISSED?


PRE LAUNCH FAQ...


What is TopsEx?
The Topsham Exchange (incorporating the Topsham Pound and Topsham LETS group) is a community operated currency and local market place.


What is £T ?
The Topsham Pound is a unit of currency, equivalent (at present) to £1.00 Sterling GBP.


What can I buy with £T?
You can exchange £T's for goods and services in Topsham, or exchange them for gold ingots of various denominations directly from TopsEx or our brokers.


What is the chance of these tokens being worth any money if TopsEx goes bust?
Each ingot contains a known quantity of gold. This metal has appreciated in "price" throughout history. There is a very good chance that the scrap value of each ingot will be 2x what you paid for it within 5-10 (?) years, and may be "worth" 10x or more within your lifetime.


Who sets the price of ingots?
The sale value of investment gold coins is regulated by UK laws, which limit the "over-the-counter" (OTC) price of our VAT FREE £5.00 1/100th tola ingots, for instance, to £5.42 each (as of 14/11/2021). This figure relates to the "spot price" of the gold contained in the coin or token, at the time of sale.

TopsEx (and our financial partners collectively listed as "SBT" here on the TopsEx exchange) have a ready supply of ingots at this OTC price which will, therefore, vary with the spot price of gold.

Local traders are able to purchase ingots in bulk, sometimes at a significant discount which they may be willing to pass on to local customers.

You may pay more, or less, privately. TopsEx marketplace, our members, financiers, and the scrap metals market as a last resort, decide the value of each token, which may be more, or less, than you paid.


What about £T held as credit on the TopsEx website?
A daily backup is taken from this website, by our service providers, in case of technical issues. All credits on the TopsEx system represent a quantity of metal owed to, or by, TopsEx and our members. You can exchange £T's for gold directly from TopsEx or our brokers if your account has a positive balance in credit.


How can you offer such cheap and easy loans?
All loans are made in, and expressed as, a quantity of precious metal. Our lenders risk nothing to assign a small portion of that to particular transactions (because the metals never leave their hands). When commitments are repaid, the gold is re-assigned. Where payments are late, lenders earn a little bit of money in terms of interest charged against a late paying account. This makes our loans quick, simple, cheap, and (mostly) INTEREST FREE!


Wait! What? No interest or fees?!!
Nearly... Where arrangements are overdue, our lenders charge 2.5% per month on any unpaid balance. Note, there is no compounding of loan interest ... if you are paying interest because your payment is late on a £5 loan, you will not later find yourself paying compound interest on a £6 loan! Our lenders, in effect, make a risk-free bet against your ability to pay on time. Plainly, it is inevitable that some members will take a little more time to repay than they, or we, expected (and will be charged interest), and some will default entirely (and will trigger our loan insurance and civil collection). These members, in effect, will be financing the project.


How much gold is in each ingot? What ingots are available?
Our ingots and tokens represent investment quality bullion, priced by the same rules as Sovereigns, Krugerrand, and other coins and bars. They are are also VAT FREE! Ingots currently range from the £5.00 "One Hundredth Tola" to the £125.00 "Quarter Tola". All are fabricated from 9ct (.375 fine) recycled gold, containing 0.042g and 0.9072g of 24ct yellow gold respectively. Larger denominations have yet to be designed and produced.

Who stores the gold?
You do! All gold traded on the exchange is collected in person or physically delivered (insured mail at cost or FREE to Topsham residents).


How can I buy/borrow/steal some £T?!!
You can fund your account by working for a local employer, exchanging your hallmarked gold or TopsEx ingots for credit on our system, or by applying for a loan which is credited against your account. We do not accept alternate currency systems without prior written commitment. We do not accept BitCoin or blockchain derivatives. We do not accept credit or debit cards and only accept GBP as a last resort. We prefer your promise to pay, or gold.


What does TopsEx membership entail? Are there any fees?
See our members agreement at the top of this page for details (once logged in), but ... no ... there are no fees for joining or using the exchange, and no interest is charged on loans which are paid 'on time' (see 'Usury'). Our financiers charge a moderate interest rate (2.5% per month) on late payments but NO COMPOUNDING OF INTEREST TAKES PLACE. We reserve the right to charge a fixed and up-front fee for the arrangement of unusually large or difficult transactions that expose our membership to your risks! ... see 'Hard Money'. Otherwise the TopsEx service, and all transactions conducted here, are entirely FREE to use for local individuals and local businesses.


What is dotTopsham?
The .topsham Top Level Domain (TLD) is an internet thing. Like the dotCom (.com) and dotUK (.uk) domain names, dotTopsham offers a namespace unique to Topsham.


How do I join the dotTopsham Internet Domain?
Simply add our domain to your hosts file!
A great explaination is available on our GitHub:
https://github.com/TopshamExchange/dotTopsham

How do I access the dotTopsham Library?
Our game servers and lending library (both FREE!) are available (once logged in) via the information link at the top of this page. You will probably need to join the dotTopsham TLD (see above ^^) for the best user experience.


What is an SSL certificate and how do I "get one"?
Essentially, SSL/TLS certificates provide for encryption between your computer and the website you are viewing. We create and sign our own certificates because of this. You are welcome to use your *.topsham domain with our SSL certificate FREE OF CHARGE.


What are the coloured "dots" outside shops and establishments?
Is this dotTopsham?! (ed. nope!)

The three "dots", read left to right, represent the three service types offered by TopsEx, and the services supported by the establishment in question. This makes it easy for members to discern which services are available at that business or operator.

 

[RHANDP]

Anyone interested in their own local currency could do much worse than use TopsEx as a model. The basic components are:

CYCLOS community banking platform (>300 users fees start)
Lender Platform (Quickfile Basic / Free)
Apache Web Host (community hosted sites)
Gmail SMTP and Google Maps - currently free.
.TLD (free optional top level domain grab via .hosts file)

Including phone calls, connectivity ...
... the project currently costs about £50 - £100 per month to keep live.
... this will increase as the user base grows.
... and as additional paid clearance services are added ... eg. gsm text banking, anyone?

Cyclos is very extensible - in fact it is a baby paypal in a box... potentially.
I would recommend startup hosting with Cyclos themselves via their community edition.

QUESTIONS:
How to manage and track community share offerings?
Is there a metaquotes/metatrader alternative which we could afford?
What would you do with your local currency?

 

[Pharaoh]

Making a local currency using actual gold is interesting. Do you gave photos of prototypes or finished versions?

 

[RHANDP]

Hi Pharoh - thanks for noticing!

No ingots produced yet. There have been problems obtaining workable metal stamping equipment and of course funds to buy the required metals... this will be resolved over the next month or so.

This is not an immediate problem as, to date, no registered user has managed to obtain a positive credit balance large enough to be an issue, and in fact some users are donating their takings to the exchange.

The moment we have the first series of ingots produced I will have them detailed and photographed... but in fact there is no hurry from our perspective. The vast bulk of issued currency will be virtual, eg. a row in our database, and a corresponding loan made by our financiers, denoted and repaid in gold, upon which credit is issued.

This post was made in the hope that we can find people interested in acting as our financial partners - the group that literally "loans our money into existence".

Each block of currency we issue represents a loan of a fraction of metal. This is converted into Topsham Pounds '£T' on our system.

To help with this - you need to have a quantity of physical gold in a commercial warehouse. This could be BullionVault or Brinks Global or any other reputable firm. You will be paying agio (fees) on the metal stored there, and will be able to show a warrant (or warehouse ticket) that confirms your holding. You will be willing to keep that minimum metals holding during the life of any corresponding loan. In return you receive a proportion of late fees, interest, or collected funds relating to any loans which go bad. This will be geared to earn around 7% per year (estimate).

There will be no risk to your deposit. The metals themselves will not move from your account and we do not require access to any of your account data beyond what is needed to verify your position.

In theory, loan repayments are to be made in metals (cheaply but not freely available in Topsham and via our website) ... currently of course it is done in GBP.

I will post some eye candy photographs once we have a stock to offer!

 

[RHANDP]

OK.

I am painfully aware that this is a very small start...
... but here is our first £50 worth of ingots:

Remember, the purpose of these tokens is to help lock economic activity that occurs in Topsham to the local area, and to provide a means to repay the electronic money we lend.

All lending is tied to a corresponding quantity of physical metal - THAT is where your gold comes in.

Questions, ideas, comments and PM's welcome.

 

[RHANDP]

Something for the weekend, sir?

Please find attached screen shots from the spreadsheet used to keep track of £T.

Happy to provide a copy of the sheet itself... IF ... you can provide evidence that you own formally allocated gold or ... perhaps ... industrial quantities of 100% Recycled 1mm square "DF" 9ct wire?

These screenshots reflect the actual situation in terms of our first currency issue which will start lending (and thus e-money creation) after the retailers in Topsham have been canvassed ... realistically 2 weeks to a month from today.

Yes... we realise the implications at sheet1:T:14 (which is only sustainable as long as the market for ingots will bear it) and sheet5:F:53 (which will halve at each new intake of lenders)...

This is not investment advice.
Our spreadsheet probably still contains errors.
You will not sue.
You will not sue!

Comments welcome!

 

[RHANDP]

So ...

Next order for gold wire has gone in ... and an interesting sequence of events is emerging.

Let's just say that I am experiencing "slippage" on actual orders! which so far only results in an increase in the cost of my order, when it is "prepared".

A look at GBP Gold on a 3 monthly chart shows a variety of "weekend effects".

Are they worth trading?

Yesterday was productive, as I may have persuaded the first investors into assigning gold to our margin account. All being well, this will reduce our leverage down to 375:1 ... from 1000:1 as posted above.

The "forward looking" figures below show the position as it should be by the end of next week.

RESERVE UNITS​	​	​	69​	​
GBP VALUE​	​	​	£345.00​	​
MARGIN LEVERAGE​	​	​	375 : 1​	​
MARGIN TOTAL​	​	​	£129,375.00​	​
MARGIN UTILISED​	​	​	£520.00​	​
MARGIN REMAINING​	​	​	£128,855.00​	​
MARGIN RATIO​	​	​	248.798​	​
LOANS OUTSTANDING​	​	​	£520.00​	​
LOANS / INGOT LIQUIDITY RATIO​	​	​	0.317​	​
MAX FWD INGOT TO MARGIN RATIO​	​	​	0.001​	​
​	​	​	​	​

 

[RHANDP]

Has it been a week already?!

Slow progress here but overall good. One new prospective lender will be added next week which will reduce our leverage still further (below 300:1).

Slippage from our order ^^ and below target production reduced ROI to 53% on this batch (21/23 ingots were produced the balance of metals added to SBT reserve).

By next week more lending will have been signed up and of course new metals issued so it is harder to predict the exact situation next Sunday.

Best wishes.

14/11/2021.​	​	​	​	​	​
RESERVE UNITS​	​	​	​	72​	​
GBP VALUE​	​	​	​	£360.00​	​
MARGIN LEVERAGE​	​	​	​	333​	: 1​
MARGIN TOTAL​	​	​	​	£120,000.00​	​
MARGIN UTILISED​	​	​	​	£520.00​	​
MARGIN REMAINING​	​	​	​	£119,480.00​	​
MARGIN RATIO​	​	​	​	230.769​	​
E-CURRENCY OUTSTANDING​	​	​	​	£520.00​	​
LOANS / INGOT LIQUIDITY RATIO​	​	​	​	0.298​	​
MAX FWD INGOT TO MARGIN RATIO​	​	​	​	0.001​	​
​	​	​	​	​	​

 

[RHANDP]

Thanks all for another good week.

We left off the gold order in favour of a new supplier - account opening in progress. These guys (one of the major UK refineries) found and approached me directly. They charge for delivery but offer a lower price per gram, and have offered account facilities which will of course make this all a little easier in some respects.

We have rescinded one loan at the request of the client.
This brings our total lending to ...
£20!

Hence the high ingot ratio, below.

New lenders have brought our max leverage down to 200:1 with a balance of £610.

Best regards.

22/11/2021.​	​	​	​	​	​
RESERVE UNITS​	​	​	​	122​	​
GBP VALUE​	​	​	​	£610.00​	​
MARGIN LEVERAGE​	​	​	​	200 : 1​	​
MARGIN TOTAL​	​	​	​	£122,000.00​	​
MARGIN UTILISED​	​	​	​	£20.00​	​
MARGIN REMAINING​	​	​	​	£121,980.00​	​
MARGIN RATIO​	​	​	​	6100.000​	​
E-CURRENCY OUTSTANDING​	​	​	​	£20.00​	​
LOANS / INGOT LIQUIDITY RATIO​	​	​	​	7.750​	​
MAX FWD INGOT TO MARGIN RATIO​	​	​	​	0.001​	​
​	​	​	​	​	​

 

[RHANDP]

Apologies for the late post - I like to do this on Sundays, however the situation with £T, as outlined above, remains essentially unchanged.

I am struggling with the university work - grades are starting to suffer despite my best efforts! My next paper is due on Thursday, and I have found that a short recovery period after these intense periods of effort is absolutely required. Therefore I am going to wait until next week before the contact work in Topsham is started.

Rest assured, I will have more time to devote to this once the grades are back on track.