From crypto queen to global fugitive: OneCoin’s Ruja Ignatova disappeared with billions, leaving a mystery still unsolved.
For eight years, the world has speculated about the fate of Ruja Ignatova: the so-called “Cryptoqueen” who vanished with billions after pitching OneCoin, a classic Ponzi scheme, leaving behind a trail of lies, lawsuits, and a mystery that refuses to die.
Crypto.news spoke with those who have dug deep into her story to get their take on where she might be now.
Shortly on her background as context: born in May 1980 in Bulgaria, Ruja Ignatova moved to Germany with her family at the age of ten, settling in Schramberg, Baden-Württemberg. She pursued higher education with distinction, earning a doctorate in private international law from the University of Konstanz in 2005. She even had a brief academic stint at the University of Oxford.
Before rising to infamy as the “Cryptoqueen,” Ignatova worked at McKinsey & Company as a consultant. However, her business ventures soon took a questionable turn. In 2012, she and her father, Plamen Ignatov, were convicted of fraud in Germany related to the acquisition and subsequent bankruptcy of a firm.
“The next Bitcoin”
It may not be widely known, but OneCoin wasn’t Ignatova’s first venture into crypto.
In 2013, she was involved in a multi-level marketing scam called BigCoin. Reports indicate that BigCoin was launched by John Ng and based in Hong Kong, with the project marketed using the usual MLM cryptocurrency pitch: “We’re gonna be the next Bitcoin.”
It’s not clear when, but at some point, the project was joined by Ronnie Skold, Sebastian Greenwood, Nigel Allen, and Ruja Ignatova herself. Long story short, BigCoin didn’t make it, as it turned out to be an ordinary Ponzi scheme, operating without a blockchain at all. By 2014, Ignatova left BigCoin to co-found a new venture with Sebastian Greenwood, better known to the world as OneCoin.
Second attempt
While Ruja Ignatova was the mastermind behind the project, Sebastian Greenwood was a key figure in the operations of OneCoin. Unlike Ignatova, though, Greenwood was arrested in 2018 and sentenced to 20 years in prison.
The two branded OneCoin as a revolutionary cryptocurrency poised to kill Bitcoin. Through high-profile events and persuasive marketing, they convinced thousands — if not millions — to invest, raising an estimated $4 billion globally. And still, like BigCoin, OneCoin also wasn’t operating on any blockchain, which led to the project’s crash three years after the launch.
On the run?
As authorities doubled down on their investigations, Ignatova vanished. In October 2017, she boarded a flight from Bulgaria, Greece and… disappeared. Without a trace. Over the years, theories about her fate have ranged from surgical alterations to mafia assassinations. Some reports even suggested that she was murdered on a yacht in the Ionian Sea on the orders of a Bulgarian crime figure, with her body allegedly dismembered and discarded.
There’re also rumors that Ignatova might actually be on the run, hiding in South Africa, Dubai, or even in Russia.
German documentary filmmaker Johan von Mirbach, who directed the 2022 investigative documentary “The Cryptoqueen – The Great OneCoin Fraud” doesn’t buy theories about Ignatova’s death. In an interview with crypto.news, Mirbach said he doesn’t believe in theories about her death, as there are too many “failed efforts to lay false tracks about her whereabouts.”
“I have talked to security sources from South Africa and Germany. There are investigations going on about where she could hide in South Africa. But nobody can tell where she really is. She could be in South Africa, in Dubai or — as you claim — in Russia or elsewhere. I’m convinced though that she is still alive as there are so many failed efforts to lay false tracks about her whereabouts.”
Johan von Mirbach
In June 2022, the FBI placed Ignatova on its ten most wanted fugitives list, initially offering a $100,000 reward for information leading to her arrest. By June 2024, that bounty had grown to $5 million. While Ignatova’s whereabouts aren’t clear, legal proceedings surrounding her name continue up to these days.
New opportunity
For instance, in August 2024, London’s High Court issued a worldwide freeze order on assets linked to Ignatova and her associates following revelations that OneCoin promoters had invested in luxury properties in the United Arab Emirates, including a $2.7 million penthouse in Dubai.
By late 2024, investigators had focused their search on Cape Town, South Africa, with speculation that she was living in an exclusive enclave under a false identity.
However, new reports in November 2024 suggested that Ignatova may instead be hiding in Russia. According to journalist Yordan Tsalov, who specializes in Kremlin affairs and has worked with Bellingcat, a Netherlands-based investigative journalism group, Ignatova has ties to individuals connected to the Russian government.
Tsalov says these links were confirmed by Ignatova’s former security adviser, Frank Schneider, a former Swiss intelligence officer who was hired by OneCoin and later interviewed by Tsalov for a BBC series.
Commenting on the scale of the OneCoin scam, Mirbach says the crypto industry is an “incredible space” not only for new businesses but also for criminals who could gain “much more than with simple analogue frauds.”
“They can just scale their scam to another level. The same mechanism that promotes and boosts online/digital business boots online fraud. Mobsters will also always go into news unexplored and unregulated markets and follow what is coming up.”
Johan von Mirbach
Now, Mirbach says he’s just waiting for the “first AI-driven fraud that is coming up with this new opportunity.”