Come next year, Netflix subscribers will get to see an all-new documentary on the streaming platform named QuadrigaCX scandal. Called “Trust No One: The Hunt For The Crypto King”. The story of the documentary comes from the tale of one Gerald Cotten; who happens to be the founder of the Canadian crypto exchange.
In 2018, he departed while on his honeymoon in India. It was assumed that he took with him 250 million dollars of the customer funds. Netflix series will focus on how a group of investors begins trying to discover the suspicious death of the Canadian Crypto exchange king Gerald Cotten and the missing $250mn, as declared in a press release.
So What is QuadrigaCX?
Gerald Cotten began working on QuadrigaCX along with Michael Patryn back in 2013, in Canada. The two had QuadrigaCX working on local trades of bitcoin (BTC). Having not a large number of employees, the duo worked for a year until they extended their business in 2014 to start a bitcoin ATM in Vancouver.
However, they faced obstacles and difficulty getting funds and eventually were left with no money in 2015. They tried their best to make it public and get listed on the Canadian Securities exchange. But ended up failing here. By next year, in 2016, the duo dropped the idea of bringing it out in the open. They gave up their legal counsel and the remaining directors left QuadrigraCX, making it a one-person business with Cotten himself handling it all.
So How Did Cotten Manage It?
Reports say that Gerald worked on his business using his personal laptop and no office location. However, success came his way and his company started growing even though it had a rough start. It went on to grow huge day by day as Bitcoin increased from $1,000 to nearly $20,000 in 2017.
With people seeing this much business and money here, they wanted to be a part of it. The company then had 350,000 customers in the trading business dealing with assets worth billions of dollars. Then came another hit and the price did not last as Bitcoin crashed in 2018. The trouble begin when people chose to panic-sell and cash out whatever they could which led to the beginning of other problems for the company.
What Are the Missing Funds?
A podcast named “Exit Scam” revealed how lot many people including Cotten’s wife awaited a backup plan that Gerald might possibly have created in case of any emergency. They were all expecting to receive any message as a consequence of the unexpected death of the CEO that would help them with getting the private key or its address to access it.
It all appeared to be very questionable when QuadrigaCX’s cold storage wallets could not be accessed or were not put into any plan of action in the case and post the death of the CEO. What specifically made it questionable was the fact that just a month before his trip to India, Cotten altered his will.
About the Actual Fraud
When it came to the knowledge that the cold storage wallets having QuadrigaCX’s reserves just had a small fraction of the missing $190 million, then Ernst & Young investigated the matter and brought out a shocking report in June 2019. It showed how Cotten moved millions from his customers’ accounts to other exchanges; using which he was enjoying a luxurious lifestyle and carrying on personal trading activities.
