The Time 'Pharma Bro' Shkreli Said A Former Criminal Cartel Leader Is Bitcoin Creator Satoshi Nakamoto

In a Substack post, penned in December 2022, “pharma bro” Martin Shkreli made an extraordinary claim that Paul Le Roux, a former programmer and criminal cartel leader, was Satoshi Nakamoto, the pseudonymous creator of Bitcoin BTC/USD. 

What Happened: Shkreli said he managed to decrypt the first transfer ever sent to the late Bitcoin pioneer, Hal Finney. He wrote in the post that “the transaction was made by Paul Leroux to Hal Finney on January 12, 2009.”

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Shkreli is a controversial pharmaceutical entrepreneur and former hedge fund manager. He gained notoriety in 2015 after dramatically increasing the price of the life-saving drug Daraprim. In 2017, he was convicted of federal securities fraud. He was released in May 2022, after serving a seven-year prison sentence.

Paul Le Roux is a former computer programmer and alleged crime kingpin. He has been charged in the U.S. with drug trafficking, money laundering, and murder-for-hire-related crimes. In 2012, the Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA) successfully arrested Roux.

Greg Maxwell, a prominent developer, has challenged Shkreli’s claims by pointing out that the type of digital signature attributed to Satoshi did not emerge until after Finney had died. This suggests that someone else may now have control of the late software developer's private key.

This story was originally published on Dec. 14, 2022

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