Back in 2014, online bullion dealer Tulving shocked its many customers by suddenly failing. See Coinweek's story: How does $40M of Gold and Silver Disappear: The Collapse of Tulving Company
Last week another one bit the dust:
NW Territorial Mint seeks bankruptcy protection
(Seattle Times) – Northwest Territorial Mint, a Federal Way company that sells precious metals and produces medals and medallions, filed for Chapter 11 protection Friday, a month after the company and its owner were hit with large jury verdicts in a defamation case.
Northwest Territorial Mint, a Federal Way company that sells precious metals and produces medals and medallions, filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection Friday.
The move came a month after the company and its owner, Ross B. Hansen, were each hit with multimillion-dollar jury verdicts in a defamation and invasion of privacy lawsuit brought in Nevada by a Los Angeles businessman.
The company's filing says it has more than 200 unsecured creditors, and its assets and liabilities both exceed $10 million. Its biggest listed debts are a $7 million judgment in favor of the businessman, Bradley Steven Cohen, and a $5.5 million judgment in favor of his firm, Cohen Asset Management, both classified as disputed.
The defamation suit claimed Northwest Territorial Mint and Hansen created anonymous websites that compared Cohen to Bernard Madoff, the Wall Street broker convicted of a massive Ponzi scheme. The lawsuit claimed the animosity stemmed from litigation by an affiliate of Cohen's firm, which had been the mint's landlord at an Auburn warehouse.
The federal judge's order in the defamation case indicates the judgments against Northwest Territorial Mint and Hansen total $37 million.
This morning a DollarCollapse.com reader (and disappointed NTM customer) sent the the following:
I've dealt with this company many times since 2008 and was accustomed to excessive delays, but eventually did receive the ordered products. In September 2015, my wife and I placed an order and paid by credit card. At the time of order, delivery was estimated to be 6 – 8 weeks. In December, they informed us that there would be delays and this repeated in January, February and March. In early March, they told us the order would be shipped in the first week of April and instructed us to call to confirm in April. Yesterday, April 1, my wife called again and the order was still on hold – that, in fact, everything had been suspended. This made me very uneasy and this morning (April 2) we called the credit card issuer to find out what they could do to reverse the charges. Their policy limits that action to 120 days, even if the product wasn't delivered. When the credit card company checked their information on NWT Mint, they tell us that as of April 1 NWT Mint is now under BANCRUPTCY PROTECTION. That is not good news, and I fear we have lost our $3,000+
