Cotten had allegedly told his wife he would create a mechanism that would allow her to access all of his crypto-related passwords should he die but. A C$24.7 million disbursement fund has been planned with C$300,000 to go to Cotten's widow, Jennifer Robertson, who advanced that amount to start the court proceedings; C$200,000 will go to Ernst & Young and another C$250,000 to its lawyers; C$229,842 will go to Quadriga's lawyers; and C$17,000 to independent contractors. Still, questions about the missing money only mounted when two Globe and Mail reporters followed up on the case. On the 9th, he allegedly died after episodes of cardiac arrest. ", He added: "We thought we were looking for basically a rich guy who had stolen money, Now either [Cotten is] dead, or if hes alive, hes a gambling addict whos broke.". Gerald Cotten, 30, held the virtual keys to a whopping $137 . as well as other partner offers and accept our. The OSC found that after 2016, QuadrigaCX stopped producing consistent data about its holdings, and that large volumes of cryptocurrencies were being sent to foreign crypto exchanges. Like many in the industry, he framed his enterprise not merely as a financial tool, but a radical societal change, touting the crypto gospel in podcast appearances and videos on YouTube. So the Globe goes to Cottens hospital in India to put the whole fake death thing to bed. Gerald and Jennifer kept most of their relationship away from the public. [17][20], In 2017, Bitcoin experienced a speculative frenzy rising in price from about US$1,000 to almost US$20,000. We pay for your stories! Here's my take on Gerald Cotten and his suspicious death. Since his death, Cotten has been recast as a habitual scammer who would enjoy the thrill of knowing he was duping his customers and investors. Please refresh the page or navigate to another page on the site to be automatically logged in, Please refresh your browser to be logged in, A lost password, a sudden death and $180M in missing crypto, Extra 20% off selected fashion and sportswear at Very, Up to 20% off & extra perks with Booking.com Genius Membership, 50 cash with friend referrals at Virgin Mobile, 15% off extra plans with this Vodafone promo, Compare broadband packages side by side to find the best deal for you, Compare cheap broadband deals from providers with fastest speed in your area, All you need to know about fibre broadband, Best Apple iPhone Deals in the UK March 2023, Compare iPhone contract deals and get the best offer this March, Compare the best mobile phone deals from the top networks and brands. #GeraldCotten #QuadrigaCX #Netflix #truecrime #wherearetheynow #gerrycotten #crypto #fraud #docuseries #truestory #biography #whathappenedto ------------------------------------IN THIS VIDEO:Sierra Walker ------------------------------------PRODUCER \u0026 FILMED BY:Chris Stiuso------------------------------------VIDEO EDITED BY:Brianna Raakman: https://www.instagram.com/brianna_raakman/ Rather than pay customers via bank wires, they were told to come to a nondescript building in Laval, Quebec to pick up the cash. Some have speculated his death was a clever ruse and there have been calls to have his body exhumed to prove it was a "fake". A Canadian bank froze another $21 million of funds. We just send money from our Bitcoin app directly to those paper wallets, and keep it safe that way. Dhanani also had pleaded guilty to burglary and grand theft charges and had been deported to Canada. He graduated from York in 2010 with a bachelor's degree in business administration. Customers reported that once they arrived, there was nobody in the office, or that there was no cash to be disbursed. Was Patryn, whom employees described as a macho, terrifying character, calling the shots, not Cotten? Forensic accountants discovered that Gerry was trading against fake users, crediting their account with fake currencies and pocketing the cash, using the proceeds to play the crypto market. [42] Another three empty wallets were believed to possibly be owned by Quadriga. Sam, Bangs & Moonshine by Evaline Ness (Holt). For instance, had Cottens death certificate, which spelled his name as Cott, , been faked? The 33-year-old has attempted to get his money back in a lawsuit, but hasn't had any luck as yet. The circumstances sparked speculation from some in the crypto community that the CEO faked his death and stole his clients' money. Mr Cotten, 30 at the time of his death, seemed to be living the dream life of a financial titan. The firm launched in 2014 amid a spectacular rise in the price of cryptocurrencies like Bitcoin, and was handling $1 billion in trades by 2017. Cotten neglected to pass on the passwords to the accounts, and in 2019, when investigators tracked down Cotten's digital wallets, all the money was gone. [17] In a 2014 interview, founder Gerald Cotten explained that the company stored customer funds on paper wallets in safe deposit boxes: "So we just send money to them, we dont need to go back to the bank every time we want to put money into it. When Taylor Monahan, founder of MyCrypto, examined the exchanges cold wallets, she couldnt find the lost crypto. His death left investors locked out of their money and left Jennifer Robertson, Gerry's wife . Cotten passed away from complications that arose from Crohn's disease while on a honeymoon in Indiaapparently taking some $215 million of customer funds to the grave. It apparently had no formal accounting system. Quadriga's customers are owed C$260 million in cryptocurrency and cash. The death, and the resulting collapse of Quadriga, set off a score of government and citizen investigations into how so much digital currency could be spirited away. [9][10], The Royal Canadian Mounted Police (RCMP) and the U.S. Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) were reportedly investigating the company. But when co-founder Cotten died during a honeymoon in India, the money was seemingly lost forever. However, in 2018, Bitcoin prices crashed and many began withdrawing their funds from Quadriga, except they were being met with error messages before the exchanges website stopped working in 2019. Cotten was young, energetic, passionate about cryptocurrency so when. He launched QuadrigaCX in 2013, and it quickly became one of the largest crypto exchanges. The Crypto King, aka Gerald "Gerry" Cotten, died in 2018, but his mysterious death is still a subject of controversy today. Quadriga Fintech Solutions was the owner and operator of QuadrigaCX, which was believed to be Canada's largest cryptocurrency exchange. NOW WATCH: Netflix is headed for a huge profit milestone in 2018, Personal Finance Insider's picks for best cryptocurrency exchanges. Despite no concrete evidenceindeed, the murdered mans first name was not the same as Robertsons ex-husband, some angry investors lobbed death threats at Jennifer, convinced that she had murdered Cotten, too. Angry and suspicious investors congregated on Reddit and Telegram to try to get to the bottom of the mystery. Zou resorted to the cryptocurrency scheme to avoid bank charges when moving Vancouver, shifting his money from the US to a Canadian account. A NEW documentary on rogue crypto trader Gerald Cotton, who took up to $215million in Bitcoin and other digital currencies to his grave, has sparked rumours he may have faked his death. "I kept asking them: Where's my money? A 33-YEAR-OLD man lost his life savings after getting involved with a cryptocurrency trader who died, taking the password to access funds to the grave. Shortly after, the exchange stopped working entirely. According to an investigation by Canada's Globe and Mail, Cotten. And for some, things still looked suspicious. California (2) Massachusetts (1) Texas (2) Refine Your Search Results. Cotten's sudden death in 2018 led to the disappearance of millions of dollars. Fake trading: I'm almost certain that he was trading with fake crypto, Chris Markay was one of the accounts that Cotten used to trade his "crypto" he also is known to have other aliases Sceptre Gerry, Aretwo Deetwo and Seethree Peaohh. Gerald Cotten, who was born on May 11th, 1988, was raised in Belleville, Ontario, before relocating to Toronto to enroll at York University's Schulich School of Business. [4] Blockchain analysts have reported that they are unable to find evidence of Quadriga's cold wallets on the blockchain, a public ledger used for cryptocurrencies. Gerald 'Gerry' Cotten died in 2018, taking password to access funds with him Credit: Netflix. Gerald Cotten, the founder of QuadrigaCX, was thought to have had sole access to the funds and coins exchanged on it. https://bit.ly/3cAIH4j Newest Vid's https://bit.ly/3JkFmEqFollow Us On Facebook https://bit.ly/3oh5cS8Gerald Cotten or Gerry Cotten's life and tragic passing are shrouded in mystery. Then, as their accounts accumulated hundreds of millions of dollars, Gerald passed unexpectedly, taking the passwords to the accounts to his grave. There was no autopsy on the body, for instance, and Cotten had signed his will two weeks after he diedleaving his riches to Jennifer. [17][29] Bloomberg also identified Patryn as Dhanani, showing that he had officially changed his name from Omar Dhanani to Omar Patryn in British Columbia in March 2003 and changed it again to Michael Patryn in October 2008. A big chunk of it was given to him by his parents. Their online exchange launched after the first month. goes to Cottens hospital in India to put the whole fake death thing to bed. [22][23] C$28 million held by Costodian, a Quadriga payment processor, was frozen by the Canadian Imperial Bank of Commerce (CIBC) in January 2018. I could have put it in stocks. But Bitcoin crashed at the end of 2018, and Cottens flashy lifestyle needed cash to sustain itself. When Quadriga CEO Gerald Cotten died suddenly in 2018, the passcodes for his cryptocurrency exchange died with him. The podcast was hosted by Takara Small. I believe this is the reason why Quadriga could be formed because they made a fortune from Scamming before Quadriga. Did he Die? TRUST NO ONE: THE HUNT FOR THE CRYPTO KINGFollow a group of investors turned sleuths as they try to unlock the suspicious death of cryptocurrency multimillionaire Gerry Cotten and the missing $250 million they believe he stole from them. Premieres in 2022 pic.twitter.com/rP9iFJHkWm. Here's a link to the BlackHat forum. A new Netflix true-crime documentary is tackling a bizarre story from the world of cryptocurrency. When he was a 15-year-old in Belleville, Ont., Gerald Cotten was selling get-rich-quick schemes on online forums that taught him how to deceive investors and cover his tracks. After beginning as an entrepreneur, Cotten founded Quadriga Fintech Solutions in 2013 and the company evolved to become the largest crypto exchange in the country, and it even helped to legitimize Bitcoin. He died just nine days into his honeymoon due to an acute stomach ache. In December 2018, Cotten died during his honeymoon with his wife, Jennifer Robertson, in Jaipur, India. [31], Robertson filed an affidavit on behalf of the company which included a "Statement of Death" for Cotten, filed in Halifax, Nova Scotia, on 12 December 2018. He was one of the wealthiest people in the crypto world, and his company was at its pinnacle. Here Is Why People Think Gerald Cotten Is Still Alive. Then it emerged that Jennifer had legally changed her name three times in the past few years, and a man sharing one of her former last names was at the center of an unsolved murder case. Another "appears to have been used to receive Bitcoin from another cryptocurrency exchange account and subsequently transfer Bitcoin to the Quadriga hot wallet" on 3 December. [52], The CBC released a 6-episode podcast about Quadriga and the death of its founder called A Death in Cryptoland. In their letter to the RCMP the law firm underlined the need for certainty around the question of whether Mr Cotten is in fact deceased. [33] After the exchange was put into maintenance mode for several days in January, they announced on the 31st that they were applying for creditor protection. "At that time, there was nothing I could do. [28], Quadriga used an unusual teller-window system for customers to withdraw their money. I didnt know that Gerry was married, he says. Investors tried to pull their money from Quadriga, but sometimes faced month-long delays. Cotten's widow has rarely spoken publicly, but in an affidavit has described herself as being subject to "slanderous comments" over accusations her husband faked his death. Cops believe that Quadriga CX was actually an wide-ranging Ponzi scheme - and Cotten would use fake accounts under the name "Chris Markay" to "buy" his customers Bitcoin using fake cash. Mr Patryn pled guilty in 2005 to working in an identity fraud ring, and did business under a company called Midas Gold as an intermediary with Liberty Reserve, a Costa Rican digital currency firm busted as one of the largest money laundering operations in history. You transferred them $1,000 and you could see the crypto in your account. 'Trust No One: The Hunt for the Crypto King' will be released sometime in 2022. Fourteen trading accounts that were also examined were used to trade on other exchanges. Gerald Cotten was 15 when he ran his first documented get-rich-quick scheme. The teen, a bright computer enthusiast from Belleville, Ontario, ran the operation on an online forum called TalkGold, and promised his investors inconceivable returns of up to 150 per cent in two days. The investors found more questions than answers. Many believe that Cotten faked his death, however, as part of an exit scam to get away with stealing millions from Quadrigas customers. https://bit.ly/3cAIH4j Newest Vid's https:. His will was signed off just two weeks before he and wife Jennifer Robertson travelled to India on their honeymoon. The mystery of Cotten and Quadriga is now the subject of podcasts Exit Scam and A Death In Cryptoland. Cotton took with him to the grave the keys that allowed access to the digital vault containing his investors cash that they had ploughed into Quadriga CX. After his death in December, his colleagues said that about $137 million in cryptocurrency belonging to about 115,000 customers was held offline in "cold storage" and inaccessible. At this point, lots of investors think that Cotten, a man alleged to have a history of scamming, really had faked his own death. The user said that he left the company in 2016, and that the company was legitimate at the time. Photo by Gaetano Cessati on Unsplash. The documentary follows a group of Quadriga investors turned sleuths who dig into the suspicious death of Cotten and the millions of missing cryptocurrency they believe Cotten stole from them, according to a tweet from Netflix announcing the film. Both Canadas tax authorities and the FBI are also investigating the company. On 10 December, a death certificate was issued by the local municipality as well as a "no objection certificate" from the police to return the body to Nova Scotia. He is believed to have carried out Ponzi scheme scams since he was just 15 - such as playing a role in pre-crypto digital token eGold, according to investigator Amy Castor. This was my entire savings, built through ten years of work, said one disgruntled customer in the doc. According to the documentary, thats around the time that Cotten started to invest his money in islands, cars and property, traveling the world while running his exchange. [2], In January 2019 Ernst & Young reported that Quadriga did not have a bank account, but instead used third-party payment processors. It has led the pack of other streaming giants, producing the most projects in the true-crime genre as of 2020. In that case, $851 million entrusted to Crypto Capital had been "lost, stolen or absconded with", according to the suit. Cottens death will likely remain a mystery, with some believing that he is still residing somewhere in the world with the stolen money. We explain how to spot them. Something was afoot. Quadriga CX was left owning its 76,000 investors around $215million (CAD). [17], In 2016, Cotten became the sole director of Quadriga when all the other directors resigned. After some more digging, the reporter found an order form filled out by one Gerald Cotten. Netflixs documentary definitely seems to be in the corner that Cotten did die, despite the mystery surrounding his death. reporters had a hunch that this was Gerry Cotten, and traced the account to another online den of thieves, BlackHatWorld. , and found an affidavit from Robertson saying that she didnt understand how QuadrigaCX operatedeven though one of Robertsons companies later wired cash to some of Quadrigas customers. Front Burner- Inside Canada's Crypto Mystery, Hot Docs Canadian International Documentary Festival, Trust No One: The Hunt for the Crypto King, "Investigation of Quadriga cryptocurrency debacle turns up only $28 million in assets", "Nothing sinister about bitcoin company CEO's sudden death, friend says", "Troubled Bitcoin trader QuadrigaCX takes another bizarre turn", "Canada's largest cryptocurrency exchange Quadriga seeks creditor protection", "Bitcoin Accounts for 95% of Cryptocurrency Crime, Says Analyst", "Crypto-Exchange Says It Can't Pay Investors Because Its C.E.O. Then Gerald Cotten suddenly died, in December of 2018, from complications with Crohn's disease. Further complicating the matter the company's co-founder Michael Patryn was revealed to actually be a man named Omar Dhanani, who had previously been convicted in the US of identity fraud. March 30, 2022. It was a perfect match, sparked up on Tinder, she said in the documentary. This was more of a gamblers high than a rich guys high as he pursued more and more of other peoples money, the stakes went up. It sucks.". I didnt know that Gerry was married, he says. lets break it all down. Companies have backups, safeguards to protect against this kind of thing. The Netflix documentary will follow investors-turned-investigators looking into theories on the founder's sudden death. Where was the rest of the money? Gerald Cotten was the founder of one of Canada's largest cryptocurrency exchanges, Quadriga CX. When Canadian blockchain whiz Gerald Cotten died unexpectedly last year, hundreds of millions of dollars in investor funds vanished into the crypto ether.
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