[2019-02-13] QuadrigaCX Users Under The Risk Of Never Getting Their Money Back

[Unblock_news]

Software Engineer Tong Zou was saddened to know that he might never get his $422,000 worth of crypto.

Last week, it was reported that QuadrigaCX Founder Gerald Cotten died leaving many crypto users hanging on a cliff because Cotten is believed to be the only person who has access to the cold wallet where all the funds are stored.

Since there were relatively high conversion fees involved when transferring money from a US bank to a Canadian one, Zou decided to put his money in QuadrigaCX. His original plan was to convert his money to crypto, convert it back to Canadian, and then file a withdrawal request, which he did in October 2018.

Read more here: https://www.unblock.news/news/quadrigacx-users-under-the-risk-of-never-getting-their-money-back

[o_e_l_e_o]

But, why?

He was trying to move transfer almost half a million from USD to CAD, and he decided to do it via a cryptocurrency exchange? I feel bad for the guy, but man, that's stupid. I wouldn't be sending my life savings to anyone or anything in one single transaction like that, let alone an unregulated and uninsured exchange. Also wonder why he didn't just do it via a bank? Factor in the transaction fees on an exchange and you are talking about a saving of maybe 1%? Was he trying to avoid taxes or something?

[Theb]

~snip~

The sad thing about this is he might not be the only one who did this method on evading ridiculous conversion fees via crypto exchanges. This has been done by a lot of people already but unfortunately for this man he did the method at the wrong time. Sad to see hardworking people like him losing all his savings in this kind of way. But there is hope, earlier this month QuadrigaCX issued a statement saying that they will figure things out on how they will handle their debt obligation to there customers, and that is something Tong Zhou can hope on even just a little bit.

[Theb]

I strongly believe this was all an inside job and people will be apart from their hard earned coins for a long time just like mt.gox

Could you be more specific with what you are saying? Their CEO did die and what they are saying is that their CEO is the only one who have access in their cold wallets. So you are saying is that the Gerald Cotten's death is just a cover up so that the company can steal their clients' crypto? I know you have been seeing news and rumors like Cotten's death certificate is falsified and that he might still be alive, but if its a cover up they don't want authorities to be right under their noses sniffing around which is the case right now.

[o_e_l_e_o]

Their CEO did die and what they are saying is that their CEO is the only one who have access in their cold wallets.

The only proof of that is a misspelled death certificate from a country which is notorious for corruption and selling fake death certificates. Couple that with things such as notarizing a will 2 weeks before traveling to India, transferring a bunch of assets and real estate to his new wife, transferring $100,000 to his in-laws to look after his pet dogs, and the fact that no cold wallets have even been found to exist, the whole thing just screams of scam.

If their plan was an exit scam, they were always going to have authorities sniffing around. The way they've set this up is smart, and it will be very difficult to definitively prove whether or not Gerald Cotten is actually dead or simply living under a new identity somewhere.

[Kemarit]

~ snip ~

His probably avoid tax or something, but damn, he has paid the price for being evasive and instead of just paying 30%, now he lost everything, bad luck or stupidity? This event has really put exchanges in bad light, and just imagining the circumstances prior the the supposedly death, you can't really shut down the idea that this might be a exit scam pulled by Cotten in front of our eyes, resulting to a lost for majority of our Canadian crypto enthusiast just the guy mentioned in this article, $422,000, that could set me up for 10 years living a good life in my country.

[cr1776]

It has been the same thing for the 9 years I've been involved:  if you don't have your private keys, you don't own the bitcoins.  You only have an IOU in that case which is pretty worthless.

And I agree, the death certificate seems odd, plus the analysis I saw a few days go didn't find any cold storage wallets matching the amounts they claimed.  I think there is a 50% chance that he isn't dead and and this was a scam from the start. 

Sucks for the people who trusted this guy and company, but don't leave big dollar amounts on exchanges.

[davis196]

Software Engineer Tong Zou was saddened to know that he might never get his $422,000 worth of crypto.

Last week, it was reported that QuadrigaCX Founder Gerald Cotten died leaving many crypto users hanging on a cliff because Cotten is believed to be the only person who has access to the cold wallet where all the funds are stored.

Since there were relatively high conversion fees involved when transferring money from a US bank to a Canadian one, Zou decided to put his money in QuadrigaCX. His original plan was to convert his money to crypto, convert it back to Canadian, and then file a withdrawal request, which he did in October 2018.

Read more here: https://www.unblock.news/news/quadrigacx-users-under-the-risk-of-never-getting-their-money-back

I feel sorry about Tong Zou.Losing a big amount of your hard earned money can be quite depressing.
Now,the only thing the QuadrigaCX team could,is to find that cold wallet and bruteforce attack the password,but it will take years to find the real password.Are we sure that QuadrigaCX is not an exit scam?

[stompix]

But, why?

He was trying to move transfer almost half a million from USD to CAD, and he decided to do it via a cryptocurrency exchange? I feel bad for the guy, but man, that's stupid. I wouldn't be sending my life savings to anyone or anything in one single transaction like that, let alone an unregulated and uninsured exchange. Also wonder why he didn't just do it via a bank? Factor in the transaction fees on an exchange and you are talking about a saving of maybe 1%? Was he trying to avoid taxes or something?

I don't understand it either.

Rather than having one bank transfer he would send money via a bank to the exchange, lose a lot by buying and then selling (Quadriga had a 600k daily volume for all cryptos, so not enough depth for 1000 BTC) and then again a wire to his Canadian bank...nope something is fishy.

The only proof of that is a misspelled death certificate

Seriously?
Common, this can't be real!!!!

[o_e_l_e_o]

The only proof of that is a misspelled death certificate

Seriously?
Common, this can't be real!!!!

https://www.coindesk.com/indian-death-certificate-crypto-exchange-quadrigacx-death

The certificate is made out in the name of Gerald Cottan rather than Gerald Cotten. That might seem like a small error, but in any developed nation (including Canada) this would quite simply not be accepted. If this is the only death certificate they have, then legally speaking Gerald Cotten is not dead, his will cannot be executed, and his assets cannot be touched.

The hospital issuing that death certificate is part of the "Fortis" chain (as you can see on the right hand side), which have recently gone through a pretty big fraud scandal.

[stompix]

~

I've said that I don't believe this was an exit scam a week ago, and, with all this evidence piling up that is making me think about it, still, I think it's too damn complicated.

Why would they go through all this charade that if uncovered would simply add more felony charges upon them?

Go to India, invent a disease, bribe a lot of guys who maybe won't keep their mouths shut, break apart your family, flee the country and live with the fear that any day somebody might recognize you or the guy who made your fake papers will get arrested and use you as a wildcard out of prison.

One server error, one hack, one "rogue" employee and he could have got away with it as others did.

[veleten]

I'd be slightly upset too if I could not get 422k + $ in crypto out of one of the exchanges
but I would have never kept such amount at an exchange
a very unlucky situation for all the traders at QadrigaCX but haven't one of the hired hackers got into his laptop and emails and such?
there was an article about his wife hiring a group of hackers to try and obtain the keys stored (allegedly) somewhere on his laptop
and that they were already studying his emails

[BLAST2MARS]

Under the risk huh? Because as far as I know, the moment that you put your assets on any exchanges then you already know that you are under that risk. Big or small, is not a criteria to be at peace if you put them there. And I really doubt that they can still get their money back because it is obviously an exit scam.

[DooMAD]

Under the risk huh? Because as far as I know, the moment that you put your assets on any exchanges then you already know that you are under that risk.

This.  Every centralised exchange user is "under risk".  Obviously when the owner is claiming to be dead, or withdrawals are disabled for whatever reason, it seems more apparent that they've lost their funds, but the risk is always there from the offset.  Why do the media insist on waiting for an exchange to fail to point out that users could lose their funds?  It's an endemic risk.