WATA Finally Getting Sued?

[Code Monkey | 2,010]

18 hours ago, MrWunderful said:

Fraud isnt a crime in Canada? Thats wild lol

It's not fraud. Like I said, I can tell you something I'm not selling is worth whatever I want. I could tell you a property down the street is worth $1,000,000, is it my fault if you buy it and find out if it isn't? In order for fraud to take place, it has to meet certain criteria and one criteria is that I have to gain an interest from the fraud. Wata helped increase the value of games they did not own and did not gain anything from the sale of games they did not own.

Whether or not Jim Halperin benfitted is not relevant to whether Deniz and Wata are guilty.

Whether or not Bronty benefitted is not relevant, he was just an advisor.

Whether or not Mark Haspell benefitted is not relevant, he wasn't the owner.

People here are confusing morals with crime, the 2 aren't the same. It was a shit thing to do but there isn't anything illegal about telling someone a product they have no interest in is worth more than it is. In fact, I'm not actually sure if the lawsuit even mentions fraud (maybe it does and I'll have to retract this) but I thought it was just about missing service level agreements.

The only financial gain Wata saw was from an increased demand for their grading service which isn't the same as whether or not a game is worth a million dollars.

 

17 hours ago, Tulpa said:

Seriously. A former president got slammed for $355 million dollars for basically what Code Monkey just described.

He inflated his assets in order to gain more loans, that is a federal offence and is not the same as telling people a hobby is worth more than it is. This isn't even in the same section of the law book.

 

17 hours ago, Brickman said:

Wildest take I’ve read in a while. Fraud is illegal. Also giving legitimate financial advice without a finance degree or license is illegal in most countries.

They weren't giving financial advice, where did you read that? Someone asked them what it was worth and he gave his opinion. If I go to my local game store and ask someone behind the counter what a game is worth, are they liable for fraud if it's not true? No, that's not considered financial advice.

 

17 hours ago, MrWunderful said:

Like you can lie in writing and its okay? Ill say “if you give me 100$ mil ill pay you back in 30 secs” and sign a contract, then i just dont and say “well it was on you to verify I could pay this back” boom just made 100 million? 

This is not comparable to what happened. Deniz did not ask for investments in his company and promise dividends. He told me and you that a game they did not own is worth a certain amount. If you go and buy the game, that's on you, it's only fraud if Deniz was the one selling the game which he was not. There is a world of difference here in inflating an asset that you own and do not own.

 

17 hours ago, Scrobins said:

You’re defending fraud, but weren’t you whining how you couldn’t buy one of KHAN’s games because he wasn’t “following Kickstarter’s rules”. You need to stop speaking like you understand the plain reading of basic rules of conduct.

It's not fraud. And yes I was and I still have not bought that game even though I think I own every other game he has made. He should follow the rules.

Again, there was deception and I don't think it was right but it also doesn't meet the criteria of a crime (except missing the SLA).

[Gloves | 11,779]

2 hours ago, Code Monkey said:

He should follow the rules.

That's hilarious coming from the guy who decided that he was entitled to pirating Tears of The Kingdom because Amiibos exist. 

[Scrobins | 1,726]

39 minutes ago, Gloves said:

That's hilarious coming from the guy who decided that he was entitled to pirating Tears of The Kingdom because Amiibos exist. 

And who openly admitted to cheating on his taxes.

[ThePhleo | 2,185]

Ad hominem.

He brings up valid points.

[a3quit4s | 4,098]

49 minutes ago, ThePhleo said:

Ad hominem.

He brings up valid points.

Agree. This is parallel to every eBay seller claiming whatever game they are selling is “rare” and a “holy grail” and listing things for 100x the actual value. People need to be accountable for not taking something at face value and do the research. 

If this was securities and not games this would be a slam dunk market manipulation SEC case. But it’s not. This is why Jim Halperin is involved in hobby items, it’s unregulated territory and he knows it from his run in with coins/comics/video games/trading cards/etc. People are always looking for get rich quick schemes and this was just the next one to take advantage of people. The people who got caught up in this and lost their shirts, well play with fire and get burnt is all I can say there.  
 

Hopefully the civil action has deep penalties, which it probably won’t, and we can all just move on. 

Edited March 16 by a3quit4s

[Code Monkey | 2,010]

3 hours ago, Scrobins said:

And who openly admitted to cheating on his taxes.

You misunderstood, I didn't cheat on my taxes. I'm purchasing games for my business.

I'm also claiming all of the games I've sold and paying taxes on that income, it goes both ways.

[GPX | 1,369]

5 hours ago, Code Monkey said:

It's not fraud. Like I said, I can tell you something I'm not selling is worth whatever I want. I could tell you a property down the street is worth $1,000,000, is it my fault if you buy it and find out if it isn't? In order for fraud to take place, it has to meet certain criteria and one criteria is that I have to gain an interest from the fraud. Wata helped increase the value of games they did not own and did not gain anything from the sale of games they did not own.

Whether or not Jim Halperin benfitted is not relevant to whether Deniz and Wata are guilty.

Whether or not Bronty benefitted is not relevant, he was just an advisor.

Whether or not Mark Haspell benefitted is not relevant, he wasn't the owner.

People here are confusing morals with crime, the 2 aren't the same. It was a shit thing to do but there isn't anything illegal about telling someone a product they have no interest in is worth more than it is. In fact, I'm not actually sure if the lawsuit even mentions fraud (maybe it does and I'll have to retract this) but I thought it was just about missing service level agreements.

The only financial gain Wata saw was from an increased demand for their grading service which isn't the same as whether or not a game is worth a million dollars.

 

He inflated his assets in order to gain more loans, that is a federal offence and is not the same as telling people a hobby is worth more than it is. This isn't even in the same section of the law book.

 

They weren't giving financial advice, where did you read that? Someone asked them what it was worth and he gave his opinion. If I go to my local game store and ask someone behind the counter what a game is worth, are they liable for fraud if it's not true? No, that's not considered financial advice.

 

This is not comparable to what happened. Deniz did not ask for investments in his company and promise dividends. He told me and you that a game they did not own is worth a certain amount. If you go and buy the game, that's on you, it's only fraud if Deniz was the one selling the game which he was not. There is a world of difference here in inflating an asset that you own and do not own.

 

It's not fraud. And yes I was and I still have not bought that game even though I think I own every other game he has made. He should follow the rules.

Again, there was deception and I don't think it was right but it also doesn't meet the criteria of a crime (except missing the SLA).

I think we all can agree there was a hell of a lot of deception and unethical practices. The key question is how much of this translates into actual illegal acts and fraud. I can see that your argument doesn’t hold quite true on some issues:

- agreed that you or anyone on VGS can say an item is worth whatever they think; but when you have a position of authority and making a false estimate on value AND making it known to the entire world, this is where minor deception becomes an exponential major deception.

- Deniz may not benefit directly from giving estimates, but there was definite indirect benefits regarding the benefits of his company staff, company association (HA) and his own personal collection would likely gain in value.

- agreed that the buyers should be smarter in learning about market values, but this doesn’t detract from the fact that WATA should also stick to service rules and legal principles.

[Khromak | 768]

I don't think the issue is any individual action, but the sum total of them. It's not illegal as a guy who grades video games to make public statements that games are worth 25 billion dollars. It's also not illegal to sell your friend a video game. It's not illegal to sell a graded video game, or to have delayed services when your company is backlogged.

If you combine all this together though, it's really suspicious and (IANAL) could be illegal.

Employees of grading company and auction house company colluding together to "sell" a game to generate hype. Not actually selling the game, but going all over the news to talk about how much you "sold" it for. Going on TV to talk about how it could be worth 10x as much, when your services are based on a % of the value of a game. Advertising to customers that they can get their products back in a week, while actually taking months/years. Meanwhile, your employees are mysteriously selling tons of games their own company graded.

If you're seen as an authority (grading company, auction house) on a thing, your word carries a whole lot more weight. @Code Monkey in your example...if you were a realtor who was listing houses, and you went on the news to tell people that you've been a realtor for 30 years and have tons of experience and that houses are skyrocketing in price and going to be 10x their value next month, so that you could earn a higher commission on the sales of houses, and then you fabricated a fake "sale" of your house to your friend, while retaining control/ownership of it, and took interviews with reporters telling them about the record-breaking sale of your house, oh and your friend just so happens to be a real estate appraiser...it might be a little bit of a problem.

I think this situation is really easy to boil down to a single issue and ignore all the context, but taken together I do not understand how anyone can see this as not problematic.

Sure, people could've done better due diligence to not buy an item for $1m when it was $50k a month prior...even though the EXPERTS IN THE FIELD were saying it's going to the moon. Also consider the others harmed through this: People who paid exorbitant fees to WATA to "insure" their graded games based on the inflated estimates. People who paid for extra-fast service, cleaning, sticker removal, etc. so they could rush their SMB1/SM64 to market to cash in on the hype. They did these things based on the information being put out there by companies/employees/advisors who were deliberately taking actions to enrich themselves on the backs of these people.

Again, I'm not a lawyer but..."wrongful or criminal deception intended to result in financial or personal gain." looks an awful lot like exactly what has been described here.

[final fight cd | 186]

7 hours ago, Khromak said:

Again, I'm not a lawyer but..

Has anybody responded to this thread who has professional experience? Not trying to say people can’t have opinions, but would like to hear from somebody who knows what the heck is going on. 

[Scrobins | 1,726]

2 hours ago, final fight cd said:

Has anybody responded to this thread who has professional experience? Not trying to say people can’t have opinions, but would like to hear from somebody who knows what the heck is going on. 

I am a lawyer, but leveraging it to weigh in on this thread any more than I’m about to is not worth it. I’ve tried to explain fraud was committed here, people who don’t know the law think that because there isn’t a specific law means that condones the behavior, but civil law provides for duties and responsibilities based on the representations people make to others. That creates legal liability. 

[a3quit4s | 4,098]

19 minutes ago, Scrobins said:

I am a lawyer, but leveraging it to weigh in on this thread any more than I’m about to is not worth it. I’ve tried to explain fraud was committed here, people who don’t know the law think that because there isn’t a specific law means that condones the behavior, but civil law provides for duties and responsibilities based on the representations people make to others. That creates legal liability. 

We can’t afford the hourly rate for your advice anyways

[Scrobins | 1,726]

17 minutes ago, a3quit4s said:

We can’t afford the hourly rate for your advice anyways

I can work on a sliding scale

[sp1nz | 612]

Whether or not actual legal issues with Wata operations exist, I'd at least think some of the following counts for something:

1: False advertising of turnarounds is probably something. Especially if proof of queue skipping/preferential treatment beyond expedited tiers of grading.

2: Didn't some employee(s) sell their own company's graded games while it was said by themselves that they aren't allowed to do that within the company?

3: Hyping up the masses and bringing outside investors/collectors to pump the market is not just that, since Wata takes a fee of 2%(?) on graded games AND it's on their appraisal, since they have to make you pay before you can even go to auction. For example: "There are no comps on this x game price but our opinion, and the opinion of big sealed collectors we are in contact with, is that the game is worth 200k so pay up 4k to get it back in your hands." All of this is compounded by the in-the-know clique of sealed collectors already having their wares full of premium "hype" items, so I'm curious if they had the same treatment as "new" customers on grade strictness, fees, queue order, auction dates and what have you.

4: Incestuous exclusivity partnership with Heritage Auctions at the start.

In case I'm wrong on things and/or nothing is illegal, there are still many scummy people and practices involved.

[Gulag Joe | 582]

10 hours ago, final fight cd said:

Has anybody responded to this thread who has professional experience? Not trying to say people can’t have opinions, but would like to hear from somebody who knows what the heck is going on. 

I’m a lawyer and it’s definitely not fraud.

[The Count | 527]

18 minutes ago, Gulag Joe said:

I’m a lawyer and it’s definitely not fraud.

[inasuma | 1,203]

On 3/16/2024 at 10:58 AM, GPX said:

Also the big thing for me from the recent news, is that they were grading games from their own staff or board members, while making the claim they were too busy to keep up with the customer’s demands and hence the long waiting times. 

 

They had all kinds of weirdness, like HA getting games graded faster than anyone else. It was the wild west over there. Between Haspel grading and selling tons of games and the chief grader getting his own SMB1 matte sticker graded (which got 9.6 overall). Even if he didn't personally assess the grade, the optics are so gross that had I known I probably would have just subbed everything to VGA. lol

[xelement5x | 65]

On 3/17/2024 at 12:24 PM, sp1nz said:

3: Hyping up the masses and bringing outside investors/collectors to pump the market is not just that, since Wata takes a fee of 2%(?) on graded games AND it's on their appraisal, since they have to make you pay before you can even go to auction. For example: "There are no comps on this x game price but our opinion, and the opinion of big sealed collectors we are in contact with, is that the game is worth 200k so pay up 4k to get it back in your hands." All of this is compounded by the in-the-know clique of sealed collectors already having their wares full of premium "hype" items, so I'm curious if they had the same treatment as "new" customers on grade strictness, fees, queue order, auction dates and what have you.

This is the sketchiest part to me.  Why should one have to pay based on a theoretical appraisal instead of just settling normal fees at the end.  Especially since the appraisal is done by a marketplace which has an incentive to inflate prices for their own bottom line.  Seems like huge conflict of interests and poor buyer protection.  

I'm sure some in this thread will say the onus is on the seller to be reasonably informed, but when we live in a world where thick legalese can obfuscate all sorts of misdeeds, then sometimes you need another body to regulate for the health of the whole marketplace.

[B.A. | 1,139]

2 hours ago, xelement5x said:

This is the sketchiest part to me.  Why should one have to pay based on a theoretical appraisal instead of just settling normal fees at the end.  Especially since the appraisal is done by a marketplace which has an incentive to inflate prices for their own bottom line.  Seems like huge conflict of interests and poor buyer protection.  

I'm sure some in this thread will say the onus is on the seller to be reasonably informed, but when we live in a world where thick legalese can obfuscate all sorts of misdeeds, then sometimes you need another body to regulate for the health of the whole marketplace.

At one point I heard that the sliding fee was due to insurance. It made some sense to me, especially when they were backed up 1+ years. They would have to do something to protect against a warehouse fire or some such. The insurance premiums go up with the value. I haven't seen this confirmed anywhere though, so who knows. You'd think the fee angst would be easy enough to dispel at least if it were actually insurance related.

[GPX | 1,369]

On 3/19/2024 at 11:37 AM, B.A. said:

At one point I heard that the sliding fee was due to insurance. It made some sense to me, especially when they were backed up 1+ years. They would have to do something to protect against a warehouse fire or some such. The insurance premiums go up with the value. I haven't seen this confirmed anywhere though, so who knows. You'd think the fee angst would be easy enough to dispel at least if it were actually insurance related.

Likely to be a half-truth, with the other part being to suck more money out of customers. It’s clear that their service was primed at getting maximal profit and in a massive hurry.