A London court ruled that Chinese law, not English law, governs fraud victims' claims to 61,000 bitcoin (about £3.8 billion, or $5 billion) seized by the Metropolitan Police, because the fraud and its losses occurred in China. The coins are linked to Zhimin Qian, who pleaded guilty to running a Ponzi scheme that defrauded more than 128,000 investors between 2014 and 2017 before converting the proceeds to bitcoin and fleeing to Britain. The ruling does not decide ownership, but it narrows victims' route to recovery and makes it more likely the UK government keeps most of the coins. The victims' lawyers are appealing, and a further hearing will determine whether any victim can establish an interest in the bitcoin.
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Original headline: UK court ruling boosts government’s chances of keeping $5 billion in seized bitcoin
Read the original on CoinDesk ↗
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