The Kraken cryptocurrency exchange is offering a total $100,000 as a reward for tips that would lead to the discovery of the $190 million dollars’ worth of cryptocurrency that’s missing after QuadrigaCX’s CEO Gerry Cotten passed away on a trip to India. The exchange says it will forward relevant tips to law enforcement, and says it can pay out the rewards in either fiat or cryptocurrency.
In a blog post announcing the bounty, the San Francisco-based exchange states:
“Kraken wants to bring awareness and attention to this case, in hopes that we can help discover some or all of the missing client funds.”
QuadrigaCX says Cotten was the only person who had access to the private keys of QuadrigaCX crypto reserves held in cold wallets. A cryptocurrency exchange that holds $190 million worth of funds belonging to 115,000 clients having no contingency plan whatsoever has raised serious suspicions in the crypto community, with some even questioning whether Cotten actually passed away or whether some nefarious activity went on behind the scenes.
Kraken has dedicated two episodes of its How to Grow a Decacorn podcast to the QuadrigaCX saga. In the two episodes, Kraken CEO Jesse Powell and Chief Brand Officer Christina Yee discuss the facts that are available on QuadrigaCX’s collapse and speculate on the sequence of events that led to the exchange’s demise.