JTIC dividend paid !

Once again, I'm happy to have bought JTIC shares. Even if JT Financials can not officially offer a regular and fixed dividend beacuse of the banking ban, they continue to pay dividends regularly.

I just received the last one, and obviously I re-invested it in more JTIC shares !

Update about JT Investment Certificates

Arbitrage Wise posted today an update on the SLCapex website about the JT Investment Certificates. To comply with the new LindenLab policy, the JTIC are no longer paying a fix interest rate.

Instead they are now a classical investment company with a target of 0.06L$ monthly dividend per share. I dont exaclty understand why this was a need, as the shares are not exchanged within SecondLife, but the move is smart and bottom line is the same, if not better ;-)

The exact information from Arb can be found here: http://www.slcapex.com/home/story/JTIC/1358

We will now see how things will go on, as today is the day LL will supposedly remove all ATMs from institutions paying interests...

JTIC share back at original price

After some strong fluctuations, the price of the JT Investment Certificates (SLCapex: JTIC) came back to its original level, in the 1.12L$ range. When JTF created the JTIC, I bought a bunch of them for 1.05.

During the last weeks, when the banks ban announced by LindenLab shook the banking industry, I was lucky enough to buy a second batch of JTICs at 0.65L$ each. This was kind of a risky bet, but now that the price is back, the question is to know if I must sell some of them or keep them all.

As I continue to trust Arbitrage Wise and the guys at JTF, I will obviously keep them !

Tuesday will be an interesting day as it will be the limit date defined by LL to remove the ATMs... As JTF no longer pays interest, I wonder if they will remove them or not.

End of the challenge ?

Arbitrage Wise very recently announced that JT Financials will be reshaped in SL Wallet, and amongst decisions result from the banking ban, cash deposits will no longer produce interests.

Those of you who read this blog from its inception (thanks a lot...) know that interests are VITAL for me as sole camping or similar activities are not sufficient. It that the end of my challenge ?

Not sure... At first the JT Investment Certificates still exist. They are not paying interests but dividends. Their future is not clear yet, and I will wait for further news.

Moreover I have other investment ideas, but I don't want to tell too much about it now... suspense...

Nevertheless if I decided to end the quest now, I will stick to the rule I defined in the very beginning and award all my earnings (roughly 23'000L$) to a member of the "Free Money from JohnLight Raymaker" group in Second Life. It is not too late for you to join the group !

A message from Arbitrage Wise

In these turbulent days where the SecondLife banking industry is under high pressure, it is important for me to support Arbitrage Wise. Not only because he helped me with my challenge, but because he is helping all of the SL community with financial services.

Given how busy he is, his answer was short, but he nevertheless answered. Here is his message to you:

"Thanks John - just tell your readers to join our JT Financial group, read the announcements on Capex, and read our updates on SLReports.net to keep updated with our current situation..."

So if you're anyhow concerned by what goes on, you know what to do. Thanks Arb, and go on !

Banco ! All In JTIC !

The anouncement by Linden Lab to remove all ATMs except those from registered banks (?) created a huge bang and mini-panic on the stock market.

My personal decision is to call for "Banco !" and put all my money in JT Investment Certificates ! So I now hold 20020 JTIC shares and no "cash" on my SL Capital Exchange account. I made this investment for three reasons:

1. Show my support to Arbitrage Wise and all the team at JT Financials
2. LL's new rules seems to apply to interests, not dividends ;-)
3. Thanks to some selling lemmings I could get JTIC shares for 0.65 L$ each !

If JTF was to fully collapse - which I think will not happen - I will lose everything. Anyway my challenge can't be achieved without a bank paying interests...

I wish new successes to JTF and Arb ! You have all my support, guys !

LindenLab to regulate banks in SecondLife !

LindenLab posted yesterday on their official blog a post saying they will start to remove ATMs from SecondLide as of 22 of January !

The only way a bank could continue to operate in SL is to register with LL:

"We will not apply this policy to companies who submit a registration statement, charter, or other applicable license from a governing regulatory authority, or who are merely conducting marketing or education, but not accepting payments."

As a reaction, many people started to withdraw their money from banks, including from JT Financials and the SL Capital Exchange. Consequently cash withdrawals from JTF has been limited (see this post from Arbitrage Wise in the forums).

For the time being I do trust the team at JTF to manage this situation, even if I'm not really surprised by LL decision. My money is still by JTF and partly invested in SLCapex, and remember that even if the withdrawal stop may look "Ginko-ish" the reasons are totally different: Ginko was short of cash - JTF is not !

So no panic, and let's see how things will go on ! The LL decision is new, and JTF will submit for a registration, so the best for the time being is wait and see. There could even be good business to do !

End of year bonus - Thank you SLCapex !

My daily routine still do not allow for time in-world, but I keep an eye on my SLCapex accounts, and place orders when needed. End of december will bring in the second JTF Investment Certificates payment, and on top of that two good news came recently:

JTIC to offer Dividend Bonus & Early Dividend Payout
The early dividend is just fine, I would not have the JTF guys working on 1st of January, and there's not a lot to say about dividend bonus, except "Thank You".

SL Capital Exchange (SLCX) to Pay Special One-Time Dividend - 12/18/2007
As a large part of the 5'000L$ offered by Arbitrage Wise are invested in SLCX, this is quite good news.

Money flows in... by itself

Today is good... it's the first time the JT Financials Investment Certificates pay interests. So JohnLight cashed 494 L$ in, and JaneLight about 50 L$.

So thank you JTF, thank you Arbitrage Wise, and continue ! At this pace, I will be millionaire in 166 years. Hopefully I also got standard 0.1% daily interests, so it will be slightly quicker ;-)

Any support appreciated...

Ooops, my mistake - On JTIC payments

No more money in the air... I misread the JT Financials Investment Certificates (JTIC) dividend payments... They start producing interests today, and first dividend payment will be on 1st of December... So no payment yesterday.

I don't have a lot more to report, as my RL is getting hectic, with potential job change, and tons of work... Even if I like being in SL, I can't be there all time so expect kind of a slow down on this blog, but certainly not a stop !

Money is in the air...

My income from daily interests has been quite low over the last weeks, as I bought JT Invesment Certificates. I left only 5'000L$ in cash by JTF, so I got about 5L$ per day, but tomorrow (may depend of your timezone) JTF will pay interest on the certificates for the first time.

The deal with these certificates is they pay 0.2% daily, on the 1st of each month. So I expect quite a good income, and may be a party at Club Josephina after that !

This will compensate for the reduction of the Cannabis Camping, whose rate dropped from 2L$ / 5 minutes to 2L$ / 9 minutes. Anyway a bit better than my minimal objective of 2L$ / 10 minutes...

No high yield deposit for me - Away from home

I have been waiting for days now, expecting to buy some 0.2% daily bonds from JTF. These have been anounced days ago, and I was thinking about how many I should buy, and so on...

But all of this has been canceled. JTF did issue the bonds, but they all sold within 5 hours, and I got no chance to get some, as I was offline by that time...

No change in my strategy then, I'll continue to camp and use my saving account. If any of you was lucky engough to get such bonds and wants to keep me informed, I'd be really happy.

Nothing else to report today, as I'm away from home on a business trip. I found an internet connection so I can go in-world (call me addicted...) and I will camp a bit this night. I also had time to meet Stroh Bing who had a surprise for me... but this is still a secret now. More on this later (call me teaser)...

Financial update

My financial strategy is still the same, I put all my earnings (camping, group fees and shop income) on my JT Financials account, where they generate new income via interests. Parallely to that, to be able to restart in case of major issue with JT Financials, I put at least 10% of my total money by APEZ. I don't get any interest from the reserve, but it's not at risk.

I could also use my cash accounts for the reserve, but this increase the risk of doing silly things with it... For the time being, the reserve is at 2'000 L$, so I don't need to do any transfer today.

To show again how good is a bank paying interest, here is an overview of my JTF account since I opened it...

Total Deposit: 13'257 L$
Total Withdrawal: 1'201 L$
Total Interest 476 L$
Total Affiliate Bonus: 15 L$
Total : 12'548L$

If I consider my total balance, excluding the gift from Arbitrage Wise, it reaches 14'548 L$. The interests represent 3.3% of the total, which is not negligible !

In fact the percentage of interests in my total wealth is higher, depending how I consider Stroh's gift after the Ginko crash, because my losses included some ineterest generated by Ginko. Anyway, this would make the interest proportion higher.

This clearly shows how important the interests are, and with time they will be more and more important with the growth of my total balance.

If you're convinced it's time for you to open an account, you can do it via the ATM in the mini-shop (SLURL in the right side column)...

Regarding the 5'000 L$ gift from Arbitrage, my results on the SLCapex market are not exactly outstanding, as by the time I'm writing this post the total value of my stocks is 3'777 L$ ! I'm still working of strategies to get it better, and will post about it when I'll have found a working one !

High Yield Deposits Announced By JTFinancials

JT Financials promised for a while that high yield deposit will become possible soon. Now the soon seems sooner than ever. There is an entry in the SLCapex forum about what JTF will offer.

From mid of October, it should be possible to buy 1.00L$ bonds, and JTF will re-buy them mid of April, at 1.44L$ each. It is quite a long period of time, particularly as time in SL is much quicker than in real life, but it's also a very interesting deal. 44% increase over half a year ! This corresponds to 0.2% daily.

As I don't need the money I'm saving, this will be perfect for me. The only remaining question is "do I trust JTF enough to go for a long term investment ?". This is by far not an easy one to answer... hopefully, I've got until mid of october !

I plan to post a detailled post this week-end about my financial strategy, and compare how I'm doing with what was planned. And may be some fun post on Sunday...

Shop is re-open !

Just as Club Josephina re-opened (great party, thanks Jo...), my mini-shop is opened again as well ! It also had its first customer, in the (very good looking) person of Genie Demina ! To visit it, use the "SLURL to the shop" in the right column, go in, first floor, to the left.

The vending pyramid is full of t-shirts, jeans, watches, and other items, for 2L$ each ! There is also the JT Financials ATM where you can open an account and become my affilate, helping me to reach the 1'000'000 L$ quickly !

Help me... for free !

If you want to support my quest, but don't want to give me money, you now have the opportunity to open an account by JTFinancials. It will allow you to invest on SL Capital Exchange, and you will also get 0.12% interest daily on the cash you will deposit there. Sounds good ?

Once you're decided, just go to the mini-shop, which is on top of Club Josephina (see like beside...). Go on first floor, on the left hand side, you will find the mini-shop, and a JTFinancials ATM. Just pay it to open your account. You can then use any other JTFinancials ATM for your operations. This will help me reaching 1'000'000 L$ via the JTFinancials affiliate system, and it won't cost anything to you ! How sweet is that ?

From Camper to Investor - Much to do

As you can imagine, my encounter with Arbitrage Wise and his 5'000 L$ gift did slightly change my view of the quest. Until now I used to be a camper, and occasionally a gamer, but now a new way of earning money appeared, and will require a strategy adjustment.

The possibility to use an SL stock exchange to invest my money and possibly gain some more is not new to me. However until now I did not had enough money nor time to start such an activity. Now, this is no longer an option, as the deal with Arbitrage is that he gave me 5'000 to invest on SL Capital exchange. I promised not to withdraw any money from there until I reach my goal of 1'000'000 L$.

So I'm now investor on the SL Capital Exchange (www.slcapex.com), with an initial balance of 5'000 L$. I will have to update my strategy, and define and investment plan. I'll also have to update the "My Balance" widget, as I moved my money from Midas to JT Financials as well.

On top of that, Josephina had troubles with the club building, and the mini-shop is out of order for the time being. Moreover, my normal (read powerful enough for SL client) computer is still not fixed. I also have to publish the underwater campsite address, and I've got a report from a member of "Free Money from JohnLight" about a prize he won on the net.

As you see, I've got tons of things to do, so I'll have to work hard to stay up to date. I will do my best, also considering RL and other projects. Stay tuned...

GUEST POST from Arbitrage Wise about JT Financials

Most people already know who JT Financials is. And I think most people want to know how we can possibly provide the interest rate we do. Well, believe it or not, we do some sophisticated RL arbitrage trading that CAN provide us the interest. But, let's assume we didn't and just take a look at things from an in-world perspective.

SL is growing exponentially right now. It may not seem like it, but we are barely the seeds to the beginning of virtual worlds. I can't remember what article it was, or the exact numbers, but I believe some article said that by 2011, 80% of the population will be in virtual world. If you believe that, and you feel that SL may be the main platform (as I do), then you have to think that with JT Financial having a strong position in the financial sector of SL, that we will benefit the most as we grow with SL. We operate one of the biggest banks in SL and have one of the best managed stock exchanges in SL. That alone should have some merit for growth and a potential buyout by a RL company.

But let's take a look into some of the other things we are doing. First, based on our interest rate of 44% annually, and our total deposits of 70M, we are paying about 2.5M a month in interest. If you look on our ATM, you will see that we have turned our ATMs in to ads - the first grid wide advertising network. And we are going to cater to Real Life corporations who can afford to have ads on there. In short, our goal is for those ads to bring in about 2M a month, and as our ATM network grow, along with our customer base, so will the revenue from the ATM ads. Let's assume we only pull in 1M a month, that leaves us with about 1.5M of interest we have to cover. We'll leave out profits from the stock exchange (www.slcapex.com) for now since profits will have to go to paying off the purchase debt, which I think should be paid off in about 6 months. If we can achieve that, we've basically bought a stock exchange for 1M from the upfront cash we paid out, is that not a sweet deal?

Now, let's look at my profile and the businesses we're trying to start up or have. These businesses will end up helping one another grow because there is some synergy in them.

-SLReports.net: already generating revenue from ads. Let's assume we can make 200K from this business a month.

-Wisemetaverse.com: this is our advertising engine that is located on all of our ATM. The system is a very sophisticated system that allows you to control textures and what item the textures give, as well as keep track of clicks. We are still trying to make this system commercially ready. Let's assume we can get 500 users to pay us 2000L a month to use this system, that's 1M in revenue

-www.slmarketlive.com: This is our retail site. It is currently up and only sells virtual items, but we're going to rebuild it so that we can sell Virtual and Real Life versions, or Sell Virtual Versions while advertising RL versions. Let's low-ball it and say we only make 100K a month (by the end of the year), even though a site selling Real Life items should make more.

-www.helpture.com: If you are a small e-commerce business and sell RL items, but need virtual versions of it built, you need a solution to find builders. Helpture will be a site allowing you to post images of your items so that others can bid to build it. The site is up, but not ready. This one can be a goldmine if you have hundreds of thousands of people needing virtual versions of their personal items built, or thousands of home-based eBay businesses needed virtual items built. Shall we peg potential profits at 1M a month?

There you have it, all of our current businesses that are in operations, or should be by the end of the year. If we add up the guestimates we just made on revenue, that's about 2.3M. We only had to cover an additional 1.5M.

Now think about this. This idea is still just a thought, but the wheels have been set in motion. We have reserved the domain www.slwallet.com. As SL gets bigger, and more retail sites get into it, they will want to accept L$ as a form of payment. By then, we'll have a VERY large customer base from JT Financials. Think BIG, as in SLWallet can be for SL what Paypal was for eBay. Instead of "We Accept Paypal", it'll be "We Accept Lindens". Someone has to provide the payment gateway, why not us? We're heading towards that direction.

So, do you see all of the dots starting to connect now? And after reading this long essay about our in-world business, you probably forgot that I've mentioned in the beginning we do RL investments that can pay back the interest alone. So if EVERYTHING I've just written about completely flops, we'll still be OK. That's putting your money to work right there.

Finally, we're also going to be donating 5000L to Johnlight strictly for trading on www.slcapex.com, as a separate portfolio to help his cause and see how he does. We have set some term limitations with him, but he'll probably provide you more details in his own blog.

Very good new from SL capital exchange / JT Financials

After my visit by JT financials yesterday, I had a chat with their CEO, Arbitrage Wise. First, it's good to have a bank where you can talk to some top managers. Even in my RL bank, this is not possible. Second, he accepted to write a guest post for the blog, saying more about the bank, and possibly answering my old question about SL banks: where do the interests money come from !

I received his post today, and as you will see it's quite detailed, and a bit longer than what I usually post, but I'm sure you'll enjoy it. And as you will see, this could give kind of a new start to my quest for 1'000'000 L$ !