Just listened to this entire podcast series the last few days and wanted to recommend it here. Gerald Cotton founded QuadrigaCX, which was formerly the most popular crypto exchange in Canada until his death in 2018.
However, there are a number of people who think he might be still alive.
The podcast does a deep dive on the foundation and fallout of QuadrigaCX, which, it turns out, was run entirely by one person from their personal MacBook. Some of you here may have even been affected by this story, as over $215 Million worth of crypto from customers was lost in the exchange wallets when Gerald Cotton died.
But the funds in those wallets aren’t even there if you look at the Blockchain.
Gerald, incidentally, has a long history of online Ponzi schemes, and was someone who shared workspace with Vitalik in 2014 when he was laying the foundation for Ethereum. Gerald was highly knowledgeable about the mechanics of blockchain technology, and ended up running an exchange all by himself.
If you haven’t checked out this podcast yet, and especially if you got into crypto after these events, I highly recommend giving it a listen. Episodes are only about 35 minutes each, and it’s an essential lesson in the crypto space for exchanges that’s are “too-big-to-fail,” the history of crypto trading online, and the fallout for when a large number of people lose a lot of money - sometimes their entire life savings.
Here’s some links to the show, and below I made a chart with descriptions of each episode:
Exit Scam Podcast on Spotify: https://open.spotify.com/show/1oMFCuyTREkANPIbJJLBP6?si=Jv27B5WaRSGBvewrcd8-pw&dl_branch=1
Exit Scam Podcast on ApplePodcasts: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/exit-scam/id1565845318
| Episode | Description |
|---|---|
| Part I: The Lost Password | Canadian crypto baron Gerald Cotten dies under mysterious circumstances while on his honeymoon in India, causing a $215 million problem for customers of his Bitcoin exchange, Quadriga. |
| Part II: The Co-Founder | The story of how Gerry turned Quadriga into Canada’s top Bitcoin exchange — with help from his shadowy co-founder. |
| Part III: The Ponzi Schemer | When Gerry was in his teens and early twenties, one thing stood out about him: his money. He had a lot of it and nobody knew where it came from. |
| Part IV: The Chris Markay Account | Three years before his death, Gerry embarks on a spending spree, buying a yacht, a plane, and even his own private island. But things at his Bitcoin exchange, Quadriga, begin to unravel. |
| Part V: The Old Friend | A friend of Gerry's once defended him and said there was no way he faked his death. But now he’s changed his mind and wonders how he missed the clues, despite being a Bitcoin security expert. |
| Part VI: The Coffin | We trace the 7,000-mile path that Gerald Cotten’s body took after his alleged death, from a Jaipur hospital to a Halifax cemetery. |
| Part VII: The Wife | There's only one person who knows what really happened to Gerry in India--besides Gerry himself--and it's his wife, Jen. |
| Part VIII: The Exit | In our final episode, Quadriga customers demand that the Royal Canadian Mounted Police exhume Gerald Cotten’s coffin. |
Hope you enjoy, cheers!
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