Knaken's €2.2M Crypto Sale Leaves Customers With Euro Claims

Records trace Knaken’s troubles back to 2020, when 23 bitcoins were taken in a hack. J. blamed the theft for a loss of many millions of euros. The stolen coins were valued at roughly €140,000 at 2020 prices. In the years that followed, the company signed up to sponsor football clubs, including Feyenoord, Sparta, Heracles, Heerenveen, and briefly Ajax. It continued to sell certificates and let customers lend it money. It did not flag its financial problems to central bank supervisor De Nederlandsche Bank.

One of the customers’ lawyers challenged the right of justice officials to liquidate the holdings. “Whose crypto was it?” he asked, likening it to a garage going bust and selling the car left parked there while the owner sees “nothing of it.”

Prosecutors said there were good reasons for the sale and have refused to elaborate. Hamm said they likely invoked Article 117 of the Dutch Code of Criminal Procedure, which provides for the sale of seized goods susceptible to depreciation. Crypto prices are volatile, Hamm said, and had the coins not been sold and then fallen, the shortfall would only have grown.

Ronald J. said he does not acknowledge the €10 million to €12 million figure and cannot explain how it was arrived at. Knaken worked as a broker, he said. The customer entered a buy order, and it was filled at the going rate, with the matched position ending up in that customer’s account.

He called Hamm’s suggestion that the money was never actually put into crypto “pertinent onjuist” and damaging. He added that every order went through the firm’s liquidity provider and had an order ID with an executed price and timestamp that could be checked against the customer’s instruction.

J. also said he is still working toward a settlement with creditors that could speed up the wind-down.

A separate criminal investigation by Dutch fraud agency FIOD remains open. FIOD raided the premises on June 29, seizing devices and assets. No arrests were made.