Bitcoin firm promoted by Kim Dotcom Bitcache placed in liquidation

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Kim Dotcom. Photo/Newstalk ZB

A crypto firm promoted by Kim Dotcom – which he once touted as a business believed to be worth billions – was put into liquidation by a High Court order this morning.

Attorney Phil Creagh – director of Bitcache until 2020 – filed the application.

Creagh is a partner at Anderson Creagh Lai – now part of Hamilton Locke – the Auckland law firm that became Dotcoms law firm in 2014 after Simpson Grierson let go of the Megaupload founder. Months later, it emerged that Dotcom owed Simpson Grierson $2 million. In April 2021, Anderson Creagh Lai asked to step down as Dotcoms attorney.

At the request of Mr. Dotcoms, the company has appointed Mr. Creagh as a director of Bitcache Limited, and the amount owed is unpaid attendance fees of $231,653.03, a spokeswoman for Anderson said. Creagh Lai.

The Herald understands that a second former director owns a similar amount. Those who participated in a crowdfunding of 5 million dollars are also out of pocket.

Bitcache was not represented at the hearing.

The director of insolvency management, Iain Nellies, has been appointed as liquidator.

In October 2016, Dotcom – via Twitter – promoted an effort that raised nearly $5 million through a Cayman Islands-registered crowdfunding site called BNK to the Future. The funds were earmarked for a project that Dotcom billed as Megaupload 2.0/Bitcache.

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The Rise’s website said: Due to his ongoing legal disputes with the US government, Kim Dotcom is not the owner of the companies. [sic] but the companies [sic] evangelist.

Dotcom said Bitcache would eventually dominate cryptocurrency by offering — according to promotional materials from BNK to the Future — custom technology built on top of bitcoin that would enable bitcoin microtransactions to pay for internet content or services.

But just 90 minutes before the launch of the new service on January 21, 2017, the entrepreneur postponed the big reveal.

Dotcom tweeted, Sorry but there was an expected hiccup. I’ll tell you more later today. Let this unfold and give me some time to update you.

He followed up with a tweet claiming to call the issue a roadblock that would take a day or two to resolve. His status was top secret.

As it happens, this was Dotcom’s last post on Bitcache.

The Companies Office lists 10 shareholders in Bitcache – all based in the Cayman Islands, Cook Islands or Hong Kong.

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Creagh resigned from the Bitcaches board in September 2020.

Before the liquidation, the Companies Office listed only one director of Bitcache: Mark Hubble, a man from Auckland. Hubble, who could not immediately be reached for comment, is also a director of Radius Recruitment, which, according to its website, recruits candidates from the Philippines for positions in New Zealand.

Hubble was also the sole director of Reuben Sims Labour, which went into liquidation in January 2021.

Creagh could not immediately be reached for comment today. Earlier, he refused questions.

Dotcom did not respond to a request for comment.

The Megaupload founder has been fighting extradition to the United States since his arrest in January 2012 for copyright infringement, money laundering, racketeering and wire fraud.

Last month, co-defendants Bram van der Kolk and Mathias Ortmann were sentenced to two years and six months and two years and seven months respectively.

The sentences were handed down after substantial reductions of about 10 years for guilty pleas, FBI assistance and rehabilitation efforts.

The third co-accused, Finn Botato, died of cancer last June.

Chris Keall is a member of the Heralds business team based in Auckland. He joined the Herald in 2018 and is a technology editor and senior business editor.

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