Trust No One – The Hunt For the Crypto King review: A cryptocurrency scam and the conspiracy theories around it

Netflix documentary puts the 200-million-dollar Quadriga crypto exchange scam under the scanner

Gerald Cotten, the mastermind behind the Quadriga Exchange scam

Trust No One: The Hunt for the Crypto King

Story: At the height of the crypto-currency boom, a Canada-based exchange, Quadriga, founded by Gerald Cotten, was handling user accounts to the tune of 200-odd million dollars. But when some users’ requests to cash out were not honoured, and Gerald/Gerry died under mysterious circumstances, taking with him the passwords to access the money, if any, to the grave, a plethora of conspiracy theories sprung up. From questions if Gerry actually died of complications from Crohn’s disease in India, to whether he was poisoned by his wife and more, the Netflix documentary shines light on all that transpired.

Review: When you are not a numbers person; your idea of investments is all zero-risk with low returns, and are then tasked with watching a documentary about cryptocurrency, trust me, it is quite mind-boggling. But if you are not ‘invested’ in cryptocurrency and can zone out during all the mumbo-jumbo explaining how a crypto-currency exchange works, etc., the rest of this documentary, Trust No One: The Hunt For the Crypto is actually quite interesting for the conspiracy theories that came up.

Imagine taking your entire life savings and investing it in the new ‘IT’ thing, in the hopes of turning it around and making a quick buck, only to see it drop off the radar without a trace. Well, that’s what happened to hundreds of investors of Canada-based crypto-currency exchange Quadriga. And if losing your hard-earned money was not bad enough, you then realize that you were dealing with a seasoned con-artist, who conceptualized Quadriga to scam people. But that’s not all of it. This guy, who was handling nearly 200-million-dollars of user money, apparently died aged only 30 of complications arising out of Crohn’s disease, while in India with his wife.

For the investors, this was a ‘WTF’ moment; only the first in a series of such moments, starting with suspicions arising that Gerald (Gerry) Cotten may have faked his death to pave way for an exit scheme scam. This suspicion was fuelled by the fact that Gerry’s death was formally notified well over a month after he supposedly passed away in India, and because Crohn’s is not known to be fatal in young people. Also, his funeral was a closed casket event, so no one really saw his body. The media also gets wind of these discussions and tracks the story closely. According to Quadriga and Gerry’s wife Jennifer, he was the only one with the passwords to access the accounts and the money. Shaking your head in disbelief? Well, so did his former investors, who then began questioning Jennifer’s role in it, considering that Gerry had signed a new will naming her as the sole beneficiary to all his assets only two weeks before his demise. Could there have been foul play in his death that was masked under his Crohn’s history?

Amid all this, there are also explanations about authorities following the money trail and the extent to which Gerry was scamming his investors, using Quadriga as his personal piggy-bank to trade with other exchanges and make money for himself. My personal takeaway is to always tread with caution where money is involved. Not everyone out there is a crook, but if you are naïve enough to believe that an investment advisor is only looking out for your interest and not his/her own, perhaps you should watch more documentaries like this.

Verdict: Much as I like conspiracy theories, I was a little weirded out at how easily Jennifer became the target of death threats based on circumstantial evidence. I have to admit that I was bored at first, but after the first 20-minutes or so, it gets more interesting. Check it out once for its true-crime-meets-murder-mystery vibe.

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