Failed crypto exchange QuadrigaCX wallets move funds for first time in three years

Several Bitcoin wallets associated with the defunct Canadian crypto exchange QuadrigaCX have transferred funds after three years of dormancy.

Self-described crypto sleuth ZachXBT reported the movement of funds today. The addresses in question moved funds on Friday, Dec. 16, and Saturday, Dec. 17.

ZachXBT estimated that 104 BTC ($1.7 million) had been moved. Of that amount, 69 BTC ($1.1 million) was sent to Wasabi — a Bitcoin wallet with a coin mixing service.

The Bitcoin addresses that transferred funds include:

• 1ECUQLuioJbFZAQchcZq9pggd4EwcpuANe
• 1J9Fqc3TicNoy1Y7tgmhQznWrP5AVLXj9R
• 1MhgmGaHwLAvvKVyFvy6zy9pRQFXaxwE9M
• 1HyYMMCdCcHnfjwMW2jE4cv9qVkVDFUzVa
• 1JPtxSGoekZfLQeYAWkbhBhkr2VEDADHZB

Four addresses listed above have not moved funds since February 2019 — close to the time of QuadrigaCX’s bankruptcy proceedings and request for creditor protection. One address moved funds considerably later in August 2020.

The above addresses were originally linked to QuadrigaCX in 2019. Around that time, QuadrigaCX’s bankruptcy trustee, Ernst and Young, erroneously sent 103 BTC to a QuadrigaCX address that it could not access. That fact was publicly disclosed, and the crypto community quickly identified which address made the transaction, along with four associated addresses that likely belong to QuadrigaCX.

QuadrigaCX’s bankruptcy committee told CoinDesk today that Ernst and Young did not move the affected balances this weekend and said that inspectors are “aware Quadriga funds have moved.” Ernst and Young have not commented on the matter.

It is still unclear who might be responsible for transferring the funds. QuadrigaCX CEO Gerald Cotten was supposedly responsible for maintaining the exchange’s private keys, supposedly stored in an unknown bank safety deposit box. However, Cotten was reported dead in 2018 and as such, could not have moved the money.

Anyone with a copy of the keys or knowledge of that box could have transferred funds. Many skeptics also maintain that Cotten faked his death, raising the distant possibility that Cotten is responsible for this weekend’s movement of funds.