CRYPTO CROOKS: BitConnect Episode 4 – Fraud Is a Flat Circle
CoinDesk Podcast Network
CoinDesk
4.8 • 689 Ratings
🗓️ 31 January 2023
⏱️ 29 minutes
🧾️ Download transcript
Summary
This week, in the last episode of the season, we look at the methodical, often slow progress of justice, and pull at one final thread: the ominous connections between BitConnect and India’s ruling party, the conservative BJP.
"Crypto Crooks" is sponsored by Chainalysis.
BitConnect’s nefarious tentacles reached across the world. So did the impact of its downfall and the fates of its architects.
In our season finale, we take stock of the BitConnect saga, from the legal fallout to the implications for crypto at large. We also take one last glance backward to think about why it all happened … and whether there might have been an invisible hand pulling the strings.
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“Crypto Crooks” is a CoinDesk Podcast Production. The executive producer is Jared Schwartz, with additional production by Eleanor Pahl, Rob Mitchell, Nora Battelle, Jonas Huck, and Moon Beast. Fact-checking is by Amber Von Schassen, and sound design and music are by Altus Noumena. This show is written and voiced by David Z. Morris.
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Transcript
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| 0:49.9 | Crypto Crooks is sponsored by Chainalysis, the leading blockchain data platform. |
| 1:10.4 | The BitConnect Ponzi scheme collapsed in early 2018, taking billions of dollars with it. |
| 1:17.6 | It's a common saying that time moves faster in crypto. |
| 1:21.2 | And a mere five years later, that enormous loss is barely a memory for many cryptocurrency |
| 1:26.5 | users and advocates. |
| 1:28.8 | And sadly, the scale of the BitConnect fraud pales in comparison to more recent |
| 1:34.0 | alleged crypto frauds. Take Celsius, which declared bankruptcy owing its users at least $4.7 billion, |
| 1:41.3 | and especially Luna, the fake stablecoin system, which destroyed somewhere |
| 1:47.1 | between $17 and $40 billion, depending on how it's measured. We'll get around to Luna |
| 1:53.5 | creator Doquan very soon, but the lessons of BitConnect are as relevant today as ever. |
| 2:00.0 | Just as the lessons of Enron, |
| 2:02.4 | Bernie Madoff, and Charles Ponzi himself remain important for investors who don't want to get |
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