Latest / The Front / Hunting out a hermit billionaire

Transcript

Hunting out a hermit billionaire · The Front

• 0:03
  Speaker 1: From The Australian. Here's what's on the front. I'm Claire Harvey.
• 0:06
  Speaker 1: It's Monday, March sixteen, twenty twenty six. Australia's biggest manufacturers
• 0:14
  Speaker 1: are warning of cost hikes and even rationing of industrial
• 0:17
  Speaker 1: goods like plastics because of the Iran War. There's talk
• 0:21
  Speaker 1: of petrol rationing and concern we might run out of gas.
• 0:28
  Speaker 1: Four of the Iranian soccer group are on their way home,
• 0:31
  Speaker 1: and there are allegations the remaining three Lionesses are under
• 0:35
  Speaker 1: pressure to also go back to Iran. We're following that
• 0:39
  Speaker 1: story and the war itself live right now at The
• 0:42
  Speaker 1: Australian dot com dot au. Cryptocurrency titan and occasional astronaut
• 0:51
  Speaker 1: Russell Wilson has an incredible story of bouncing back from
• 0:55
  Speaker 1: multimillion dollar fraud on his company Coinspot. But when we
• 0:59
  Speaker 1: try to track him down for the list Australia's Richest
• 1:02
  Speaker 1: two fifty, Wilson proved elusive, which made us even more intrigued.
• 1:08
  Speaker 1: That's today's story. Angelica Snowden is a business reporter with
• 1:16
  Speaker 1: The Australian and this year she's involved in one of
• 1:19
  Speaker 1: my favorite parts of the Australian it's called the List
• 1:21
  Speaker 1: Australia's Richest to fifty each year. It's a list of
• 1:25
  Speaker 1: obviously billionaires. And one of the things I love about
• 1:28
  Speaker 1: the list is that you John Stenzelt, the editor, and
• 1:31
  Speaker 1: some of our other reporters have to actually hunt these
• 1:33
  Speaker 1: billionaires down, but don't actually want us to tell the
• 1:36
  Speaker 1: world how rich they are all the time.
• 1:38
  Speaker 2: As it happens, apparently some of the time they don't,
• 1:41
  Speaker 2: which is actually pretty interesting. I think you might find
• 1:44
  Speaker 2: that many of the people who are involved in the
• 1:46
  Speaker 2: list are very happily interviewed, and you know, they get
• 1:49
  Speaker 2: pictured on yachts or you know, on their private jets. Perhaps,
• 1:53
  Speaker 2: But as it happens, the fellow that I was reporting
• 1:56
  Speaker 2: on this year did really not want to be involved
• 1:58
  Speaker 2: at all. His name is Russell Wilson. He is a
• 2:05
  Speaker 2: crypto billionaire. He's from Melbourne. He's pretty young, he's forty
• 2:09
  Speaker 2: four years old. I think many people would have heard
• 2:12
  Speaker 2: of his company, Coinspot, which is one of Australia's biggest
• 2:16
  Speaker 2: crypto exchanges. But Claire, I don't know if you're involved
• 2:19
  Speaker 2: in crypto.
• 2:20
  Speaker 1: I'm hoping that crypto will be like non fungible tokens
• 2:22
  Speaker 1: that if I ignore it for long enough, it will
• 2:24
  Speaker 1: just go away and no one will ever talk about
• 2:26
  Speaker 1: it again. So I've been waiting about a decade now
• 2:28
  Speaker 1: with crypto. I don't I don't know what these things
• 2:30
  Speaker 1: are going away.
• 2:31
  Speaker 2: I don't know. It seems to not be going away.
• 2:34
  Speaker 2: And if Russell Wilson's wealth is anything to go by,
• 2:38
  Speaker 2: I think it may have a very strong future. So,
• 2:41
  Speaker 2: you know, essentially, Russell Wilson launched his company in twenty
• 2:45
  Speaker 2: thirteen with you know, a couple of one hundred customers.
• 2:48
  Speaker 2: I imagine it very quickly grew to a few hundred
• 2:52
  Speaker 2: thousand a couple of years later, and today it is
• 2:55
  Speaker 2: Australia's biggest crypto exchange platforms by a lot of people.
• 3:00
  Speaker 2: It's very well known. As I said, the company is
• 3:03
  Speaker 2: well known, but the man behind it is really not.
• 3:06
  Speaker 2: He's virtually anonymous. He has gone to extreme lengths to
• 3:11
  Speaker 2: keep his identity private, completely private.
• 3:14
  Speaker 1: Is that because he's worried about his safety?
• 3:17
  Speaker 2: My colleague and I, Liam Mendez, spent a number of
• 3:20
  Speaker 2: months really trying to track him down and to work
• 3:24
  Speaker 2: out why he wanted to keep this level of privacy.
• 3:27
  Speaker 2: He says it's to protect his family. He ultimately did
• 3:30
  Speaker 2: supply us with a pretty short statement to a very
• 3:33
  Speaker 2: very long list of questions that we had. But I
• 3:36
  Speaker 2: think what you might find interesting, Claire, is that while
• 3:40
  Speaker 2: on the one hand, he really really strives to privacy,
• 3:43
  Speaker 2: on the other hand, we actually tracked down a video
• 3:45
  Speaker 2: of him in space on Jeff Bezos's spaceship In a
• 3:50
  Speaker 2: similar way. Did you hear about Katie Perry Drick?
• 3:52
  Speaker 1: Oh yeah, I'm hoping that she kissed the Earth when
• 3:55
  Speaker 1: she came back. She's sang a really cringe withy song
• 3:57
  Speaker 1: while she was up there sing did he kiss it?
• 4:00
  Speaker 1: Did he wear a skin Sight blue jumpsuit?
• 4:02
  Speaker 2: Indeed he did, He absolutely did. On his jumpsuit it
• 4:07
  Speaker 2: does say R. Wilson, But in all of the press
• 4:10
  Speaker 2: clippings about that particular mission, he's referred to as an
• 4:14
  Speaker 2: anonymous six crew member. So it's a really really bizarre
• 4:18
  Speaker 2: kind of story here. You know, I'm a business reporter.
• 4:25
  Speaker 2: A lot of my stories come through courts and court reporting,
• 4:28
  Speaker 2: and initially I heard about this on another podcast. It
• 4:32
  Speaker 2: was really all about this fraud that affected coinspot. But
• 4:36
  Speaker 2: what was kind of the missing piece in that podcast
• 4:38
  Speaker 2: was who was the man behind this company, and as
• 4:41
  Speaker 2: it turns out, it's Russell Wilson, who is from suburban Melbourne,
• 4:47
  Speaker 2: and that's really where I my interest in this story
• 4:50
  Speaker 2: first kicked off.
• 4:51
  Speaker 1: Yeah, it involved a scammer, an Englishman living in the
• 4:56
  Speaker 1: city of Blackpool, which is a seaside town in Lancashire,
• 5:00
  Speaker 1: famously bleak and wind swept, like most British seaside towns.
• 5:05
  Speaker 1: I must say, what was the scam, how did it happen?
• 5:09
  Speaker 2: James Parker, who was at the center of this fraud,
• 5:13
  Speaker 2: lived in a mold infested flat and he was poor,
• 5:18
  Speaker 2: you know, living in poverty essentially, but he discovered how
• 5:22
  Speaker 2: to exploit coinspot and mister Wilson's platform. What it involved
• 5:28
  Speaker 2: was taking bitcoin from the platform without actually buying it.
• 5:33
  Speaker 1: James Parker has now passed away, so he never actually
• 5:37
  Speaker 1: faced justice for what he allegedly did to Coinspot, but
• 5:41
  Speaker 1: that must have been devastating, not just for Russell Wilson,
• 5:45
  Speaker 1: but for the few hundred people at that stage who
• 5:46
  Speaker 1: had their money in Coinspot.
• 5:48
  Speaker 2: Absolutely again going back to my interest in this story,
• 5:53
  Speaker 2: after listening to the podcast, we sort of worked out, well,
• 5:56
  Speaker 2: where's Russell Wilson's voice in all of this. You know,
• 5:59
  Speaker 2: this is his company. He nearly lost the entire company
• 6:03
  Speaker 2: at this point, you know, a few years ago, and
• 6:04
  Speaker 2: now he's worth one point one billion dollars. About forty
• 6:08
  Speaker 2: million dollars was taken out of this platform, and as
• 6:11
  Speaker 2: I understand it, it was customers bitcoin. And in court
• 6:16
  Speaker 2: documents transcripts that I've obtained from the UK, we've got
• 6:21
  Speaker 2: Russell Wilson's account of him trying to negotiate with the
• 6:26
  Speaker 2: scammers in real time about how to get the money back,
• 6:30
  Speaker 2: and he described it as literally the worst week of
• 6:33
  Speaker 2: my life. That's a quote that came from these documents.
• 6:37
  Speaker 2: And what we discovered was that in a nightly reconciliation process, Wilson,
• 6:44
  Speaker 2: who is very involved in the company, discovered that the
• 6:48
  Speaker 2: reconciliation was out by millions of dollars and ultimately learned
• 6:54
  Speaker 2: that this glitch existed in the platform and that it
• 6:56
  Speaker 2: had been abused basically, and forty dollars had been taken.
• 7:01
  Speaker 2: So what he then embarked on was this intense back
• 7:06
  Speaker 2: and forth with James Parker, James Parker's financial advisor, who
• 7:12
  Speaker 2: has now been jailed over this scheme. And you know,
• 7:16
  Speaker 2: it's an incredible tale. He I think his first and
• 7:19
  Speaker 2: last conversation with James Parker was while James Parker was
• 7:23
  Speaker 2: being wheeled through an airport on a wheelchair from the
• 7:26
  Speaker 2: UK trying to go to Jubai, you know. So he
• 7:29
  Speaker 2: really thought at that point like, I'm going to lose
• 7:32
  Speaker 2: this company and I'm going to lose all of this money,
• 7:35
  Speaker 2: is what he told the court. Ultimately, the money has
• 7:37
  Speaker 2: been returned largely and UK authorities have through proceeds of Crime,
• 7:44
  Speaker 2: got all of the cash most of the cash back
• 7:46
  Speaker 2: is what I understand. But it's pretty incredible.
• 7:49
  Speaker 1: What do you think about bitcoin having absorbed this whole episode.
• 7:55
  Speaker 2: I guess it's you know, again, like you, I do
• 7:59
  Speaker 2: not dabble him in bitcoin or cryptocurrency by any stretch.
• 8:04
  Speaker 2: I think maybe Liam does, but I, you know, maybe
• 8:08
  Speaker 2: we should ask.
• 8:08
  Speaker 1: Him it's be getting paid too much.
• 8:13
  Speaker 2: I think that those concerns, you know, that's what the
• 8:17
  Speaker 2: concern was ten or five years ago, right, and I
• 8:20
  Speaker 2: think that's what the concern remains as far as I
• 8:23
  Speaker 2: can tell. I should say that in response to our questions,
• 8:26
  Speaker 2: you know, Wilson said they're really focusing on the security
• 8:31
  Speaker 2: of the platform and that they insist you know nothing
• 8:33
  Speaker 2: like this is going to happen to the platform again,
• 8:35
  Speaker 2: and that they work with regulators and authorities.
• 8:38
  Speaker 1: Now coming up, why did Russell Wilson's team threaten to
• 8:46
  Speaker 1: call the cops on the Australian. So tell me about
• 9:08
  Speaker 1: your and Liamb's adventures kind of tracking him down. What
• 9:11
  Speaker 1: did you do and how did you find him and
• 9:13
  Speaker 1: what did he say when you eventually did.
• 9:16
  Speaker 2: Russell lives in Berwick, which is about an hour drive
• 9:22
  Speaker 2: sort of southeast of Melbourne. When you're there, you feel
• 9:25
  Speaker 2: like you're in the country. It really doesn't feel like
• 9:28
  Speaker 2: you're close to any kind of city. He really didn't
• 9:31
  Speaker 2: want to talk to us. We tried the old fashioned
• 9:34
  Speaker 2: sort of approach of knocking on his door, except you
• 9:37
  Speaker 2: can't really get to his door because it's got like
• 9:40
  Speaker 2: huge gates. There's a security sort of guard always stationed
• 9:45
  Speaker 2: like outside of the house, but in the sort of
• 9:49
  Speaker 2: perum at us. So, I mean, look, we're doing our jobs, right,
• 9:52
  Speaker 2: We've obtained all of this information. It's really our job
• 9:55
  Speaker 2: to be able to put this to Russell and to
• 9:57
  Speaker 2: ask him what he wants to say and if you
• 9:59
  Speaker 2: can tell us anything else. But ultimately he wouldn't, and
• 10:04
  Speaker 2: we tried walking up to the gate a number of times.
• 10:07
  Speaker 2: We parked our car outside and were approached by security
• 10:11
  Speaker 2: guards a number of times, you know, Liam in particular,
• 10:14
  Speaker 2: told to leave, told that the police have been called.
• 10:19
  Speaker 1: We just want to put you on the rich list man.
• 10:23
  Speaker 2: It was pretty extreme. We did get some pictures of
• 10:27
  Speaker 2: Russell walking out of his Fried Chicken shop, which he
• 10:31
  Speaker 2: also owns in Mary.
• 10:33
  Speaker 1: This is the hilarious thing about it too. He looks
• 10:35
  Speaker 1: very sort of furtive, and it doesn't look good. It
• 10:40
  Speaker 1: would have been better to stand still, have a lovely
• 10:42
  Speaker 1: photo taken. We could have organized some hair and makeup
• 10:45
  Speaker 1: for him. You know, it made him look good, put
• 10:46
  Speaker 1: him on the cover.
• 10:47
  Speaker 2: Hopefully he will talk to us one day in the future.
• 10:49
  Speaker 2: So I don't know if he's listening, but I really
• 10:52
  Speaker 2: still want to talk to you if you are.
• 10:57
  Speaker 1: I always find it intriguing that Johnston results time is
• 11:01
  Speaker 1: spent persuading some of the billionaires to talk to him,
• 11:04
  Speaker 1: and then dealing with the others who are very keen
• 11:07
  Speaker 1: to talk. He's had some hilarious covers of that magazine
• 11:10
  Speaker 1: where people are posing up in dressing gowns that he
• 11:13
  Speaker 1: had a bunch of billionaires in a pool recently. What
• 11:17
  Speaker 1: does it tell us about wealth and about Australian's desire
• 11:21
  Speaker 1: to be seen to be rich.
• 11:23
  Speaker 2: You know, we live in a social media world. We
• 11:26
  Speaker 2: live online, our lives are played out online normally. In
• 11:32
  Speaker 2: this case it's the opposite. Coinspot really doesn't have much
• 11:36
  Speaker 2: of a presence online. Russell definitely does not. Their entire
• 11:42
  Speaker 2: sort of company and the people behind it are just anonymous.
• 11:46
  Speaker 2: And I think it's very unusual to find somebody who
• 11:50
  Speaker 2: has this much influence and power and money who doesn't
• 11:55
  Speaker 2: want to be seen to be using it perhaps or
• 11:59
  Speaker 2: to be partially known for it.
• 12:02
  Speaker 1: Angelicus noden Is Business reported with The Australian. Thanks a
• 12:05
  Speaker 1: thank you, Claire. You can read Ange's story right now
• 12:17
  Speaker 1: at The Australian dot com dot au and the list
• 12:20
  Speaker 1: Australia's Riches two fifty will be published on Friday