Dr Craig Wright is an Australian computer scientist who wrongly claimed he created Bitcoin (BTC). His case has been sent to the Crown Prosecution Service so that he can be charged with perjury and forgery.
Wright lost a court case in March 2024 against a group of crypto companies that sued ahead of time to stop him from pursuing his claim in court. The fact that Justice Mellor, the judge in charge, gave a rare oral verdict just seconds after the case ended shows how badly he lost.
‘The evidence is overwhelming that Dr Wright is not the author of the BTC white paper’, Mellor said. Following the oral and written evidence, Mellor said in the written judgement that Wright lied ‘extensively and repeatedly’. Most of Wright’s lies were about the fake papers he used to back up his claim in his efforts to show that he was or was Satoshi Nakamoto.
There were also hints that Wright’s written evidence might not be real before the trial even started, and his expert witnesses seemed to agree. Wright denied the claims during questioning and said his expert witness was not properly trained, which angered crypto users including Bhaggo app players.
In the ruling, Mellor said he would send the Crown Prosecution Service (CPS) relevant papers so they could decide if Wright should be charged with a crime. ‘In advancing his false claim to be Satoshi through multiple legal actions, Dr Wright committed a most serious abuse of the process of the courts of the UK, Norway and the USA’.
BlackRock’s Larry Fink calls BTC digital gold
Larry Fink, CEO of BlackRock, said he was wrong about his initial thoughts on Bitcoin (BTC) and is now calling the decentralised currency digital gold and a legitimate currency. BlackRock is the biggest hedge fund in the world which manages $10.6 trillion in assets and is the biggest BTC investing fund.
‘I was a skeptic, a proud skeptic. It is a legitimate financial instrument that allows you to maybe have uncorrelated types of returns. I believe it is an instrument that you invest in when you’re more frightened, though. It is an instrument when you believe countries are debasing their currency by excess deficits, and some countries are’, Fink said.
Fink then talked about how the economic and political situation in some countries is getting worse. This includes how BTC might give people in those places a way to invest in something outside of their countries.
BlackRock’s iShares Bitcoin Trust (IBIT) passed Grayscale Bitcoin Trust (GBTC) as the world’s biggest BTC exchange-traded investment fund in May 2024. As of July 2024, the fund received more than $18 billion in new investments so far.
The asset manager also changed the purpose of Bitcoin ETF shares by adding them to its Strategic Income Opportunities Fund (BSIIX) and the Strategic Global Bond Fund (MAWIX). This shows that BTC could help buyers who are looking for income, including retirees.
The price of BTC rose in response to Fink’s remarks. It was also followed by other bullish events, such as the German government selling its last BTC. This put an end to the severe selling pressure that had resulted from dumping 50,000 coins onto the market.
With BTC on the rise, crypto users including Bhaggo app players are looking forward to the continued growth of the market that will propel other major coins along with it. Many believe that it’s only a matter of time before crypto becomes one of the most popular currencies in the world.
