The Missing Cryptoqueen: the hunt for a multi-billion-dollar scam artist - bogus currency with a cult-like recruitment programme

Georgia Catt remembers the first time she heard the name One Coin. A friend had just gone all in on a Bitcoin-style cryptocurrency that seemed to be booming. They had poured in €70,000. “They were absolutely invested, saying it was going to be the next big thing,” she recalls.

To Catt, a BBC radio producer, the promise of vast returns on something virtually no one had heard of seemed too good to be true. She started researching One Coin, and ended up unearthing what she describes as the “perfect scam”: a multi-billion dollar con that combined a bogus currency with a cult–like recruitment programme that fed into a pyramid scheme.

Above all, she was surprised how little coverage there had been. “It was a hyper version of so much stuff playing out in the world right now: the hype around technology, the fear of missing out, how easy it is to construct credibility, distrust in the establishment and mainstream media.” Catt also thought the swindle would make a great podcast. She was right. The Missing Cryptoqueen – the show she and technology journalist Jamie Bartlett have made about One Coin – has been a huge hit, with its much-anticipated finale released today.

But who is the Cryptoqueen? Catt and Bartlett were hooked on the One Coin swindle, with its twists and turns and tales of ordinary people who lost it all. The first such person they meet, Jen McAdam, not only invested her own money but convinced her family to invest theirs too, to the tune of £220,000. But more than that, they were intrigued by its founder, Bulgarian-born Dr Ruja Ignatova, who went to ground in 2017, just as law enforcement were starting get wind of the company. Ignatova was due to attend an event in Lisbon, but boarded a plane to Athens and disappeared. Her brother Konstantin has since been detained by the FBI.
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