Interpol confirmed that Do Kwon, the founder of a collapsed TerraUSD and Luna, was arrested at Podgorica airport in Montenegro. Several other countries were after him, including the USA, Singapore, and South Korea.
He was wanted in South Korea and Singapore on fraud charges amid several other allegations. The verified Twitter account of Coin Bureau also confirmed, stating, “Do Kwon was arrested with numerous forged documents. These included passports from Costa Rica and Belgium and a Hawaiian driver’s license.”
Kwon is a Computer Science graduate from Stanford College. He later joined Microsoft as a software engineer and served Apple in a similar position. Kwon later got interested in the crypto sector and developed two stablecoin projects, Basic Cash and Terra Luna(Luna).
Both crypto projects of Kwon became popular soon after their development and grew to multi-billion dollars in context to market capitalization. Although it is believed that both projects failed after they were termed Ponzi.
Terra ecosystem cost the investors of TerraUSD and LUNA an estimated loss of $42 billion, per analytic firm Elliptic. This incident triggered a domino effect with a major Bitcoin, Ethereum, and Tether sell-off. The post-effects of collapse continued, which forced several other firms to pack their bags and quit the market.
On 24 March, Interpol National Central Bureau in Seoul informed CNN that the identity of TerraUSD and Luna founder was confirmed after matching the fingerprints. The word’ crypto winters’ came into existence after the massive failure of algorithmic stablecoin and its sister token Luna.
The arrested TerraUSD founder Kwon Do-hyung himself, has invested in 15+ companies, including Fractal, Jambo, Aperture, Seashell, Pstake, Klaycity, and many others. The founder of TerraUSD was ranked as one of the richest gaming entrepreneurs by Forbes in 2019 and was the richest crypto enthusiast in Korea.
The Red Alert Notice against the TerraUSD founder was issued by Interpol back in September 2022 at the special request of the South Korean Prosecutors. Since September 2022, several national agencies, including Interpol, have been working hard to trace and detain Do Kwon.
Some major market players affected by the collapse of TerraUSD were:
- Three Arrow Capital
- Voyager Digital
- Celsius,
… and a couple of other investment firms that filed for bankruptcy.
Major Crypto Events in 2022
One of the major events that stirred the crypto market in 2022 was FTX failure; the crypto exchange was co-founded by Sam Bankman Fried, among the youngest crypto billionaires. FTX collapse forced dozens of firms to file for bankruptcy- some renowned are BlockFi and Genesis.
BlockFi’s connection with FTX was much bigger than the report suggested before. The firm went for Chapter 11 bankruptcy at the end of November, soon after the bankruptcy of FTX, which accepted to take out the fighting lender before its downfall.
Andrew is a blockchain developer who developed his interest in cryptocurrencies while his post-graduation. He is a keen observer of details and shares his passion for writing along with being a developer. His backend knowledge about blockchain helps him give a unique perspective to his writing
Source: https://www.thecoinrepublic.com/2023/03/24/terrausds-do-kwon-arrested-in-montenegro-confirms-interpol/