The sudden death of a controversial financial investor left behind a bitcoin fortune estimated to be worth more than $2 billion.
According to local news reports, Mircea Popescu drowned off the coast of Costa Rica at the age of 41. The trending topic behind his death is what will happen to his fortune.
Popescu started investing in cryptocurrency in the very early stages of its inception, having established what was known to be the “bitcoin securities exchange” MPEx in 2012, and was also known as “the father of bitcoin toxicity” by some.
Popescu was also a blogger that used toxic language which defended and advocated bitcoin and its technological infrastructure.
“Bitcoin is fate. It operates completely outside of any human agency. For all you know about [bitcoin creator Satoshi] Nakamoto, bitcoin might as well have created itself,” he wrote in a post.
“Bitcoin can kill all your friends and all the people you respect….it can poop in your drink and rape your pets…If lightning strikes where you sit, whether you feel a warm cosy sort of love or the most burning hatred imaginable is strictly irrelevant – electricity stays.”
Former CoinDesk editor-in-chief Pete Rizzo said Popescu was seen as an enemy and fierce competitor towards other notable figures within the bitcoin community in its early years.
Following the news of Popescu’s death, Rizzo tweeted, “Mircea will endure as one of bitcoin’s most vilified figures and inarguably one of its greatest philosophers.”
