CORRECTED - Anshe Chung to open cross-platform financial exchange
By Adam Reuters
(Removes mention of Anshe Chung Studios creating real-world automated teller machine cards)
SECOND LIFE, May 21 (Reuters) - Anshe Chung Studios plans to launch a cross-platform financial market and currency exchange that spans virtual worlds including Second Life and Entropia Universe by early next month.
The company, whose eponymous founder claims to have accumulated more than US$1 million worth of assets in Second Life, said in a statement that the new market would allow Second Life residents to invest their Linden dollars in Entropia, and vice versa. The new market will also include other virtual worlds such as IMVU.
“In the real world, the flow of capital and investment across national borders has always been a driving force for political progress, economic reforms and the emergence of a global conscience and economy”, said Guni Graef (Second Life name: Guni Greenstein), chief executive of Anshe Chung Studios and the husband of Ailin Graef (SL: Anshe Chung).
“We believe that allowing residents in a virtual world, no matter which one they have chosen to live in, to easily diversify their portfolio of virtual investments into other virtual worlds is going to lead to a paradigm shift,” he added. “At ACS we are convinced that once capital is flowing freely, people, goods and services will follow and eventually we will see incentive and pressure for the emergence of open tools and standards.”
The company, based in Wuhan, China, said its new platform would not directly offer to trade virtual currency for real cash — a practice known as real-money transfers. But Entropia and Second Life both allow real-money transfers, which in the case of Second Life has led to scrutiny from real-world tax and law enforcement authorities.
The new platform may create increased opportunities for virtual world arbitrage, allowing users to take advantage of pricing differentials between markets. For example, Entropia, created by Sweden’s Mindark SA, offers a fixed rate of 10 Project Entropia Dollars for 1 U.S. dollar. In Second Life, the Linden dollar exchange rate fluctuates according to supply and demand; it currently trades at L$286: US$1.
Anshe Chung Studios recently acquired a banking license in Entropia and plans to introduce an automated teller machine (ATM) card that will allow users to withdraw real money from their Entropia Dollar accounts. The company said that its trading platform and in-world ATM links are currently undergoing testing with a small group of investors.
“We are not planning to offer a debit card for Entropia, that is a project that Mindark may be pursuing with RL banks,” Guni Greenstein added in an email to Reuters on Tuesday. “We will operate ATMs in Second Life and other worlds to withdraw/deposit virtual currency. That is not related to real life ATM machines and debit cards.”
