The app and its infrastructure was created by a single, very inexperienced programmer. The app's original author, Zhou Tong, is only 17[1].

Not that age is an indicator of experience in general, but it's certainly the case here. I'm honestly shocked at the amount of trust placed in Bitcoinica.

An interesting display of the oft mentioned Stockholm Syndrome happening elsewhere on the forum here https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=93100.0

[1] http://coinabul.tumblr.com/post/24022841613/10qs-zhou-tong-b...

Edit: added reference.