Jörg Molt is someone that, until very recently, many in the crypto world might not have heard of. Some may still not know who he is, which in some ways is for the best. Nevertheless, the German, dubbed ‘Satoshi Nakamolto’, has grabbed headlines recently for his claims to, yes, be Bitcoin’s pseudonymous creator, Satoshi Nakamoto. This time however his claims have been rubbished by a number of high profile individuals and one already infamous video clip.
Molt was already known to a small cluster of people in the industry, mostly victims of his scam projects and his claim that he is the “co-founder of Bitcoin”, but he shot to fame last Friday when a video emerged of Molt being confronted by crypto YouTuber and podcast host Kenneth Bosak at the recent World Crypto Conference in Las Vegas:
Confronting a scammer at @WorldCryptoCon
His name is @joergmolt and he is a scammer! pic.twitter.com/lMT4BP8FkK
— BitCoin Co-founder (@KennethBosak) November 1, 2019
Suddenly, Molt’s name was everywhere, as was his spurious, evidence-free claim to have created Bitcoin. Like many in the space, Bosak took exception to any individual claiming to be Bitcoin’s creator, but it seems that Molt’s past as a scam artist was also among the reasons for the confrontation. Alongside claiming to have co-founded Bitcoin, Molt also runs the Satoshi School, “the only school in the world that teaches exclusively about BitCoin and BitCoin blockchain technology”. Glossing over the fact that you can learn everything about Bitcoin for free online, it has been suggested that this school is simply a multi-level marketing ploy that plays on Molt’s self-awarded title, much in the same way Craig Wright sells the vision of Bitcoin SV on the fact that he is (so he says) in fact Bitcoin’s creator. If the success of this school is underpinned by Molt’s claim to have co-founded Bitcoin, then he must be regretting an interview with Steven Melnik where he claims that everyone working towards the creation of a digital money were, in their own ways, all co-founders. That sound is the sound of a mask slipping.
Molt Outed for Scams
Fingers are also pointed at Molt because of his history as an alleged scammer. This includes the Bitcoin Retirement Plan, which asked investors to contribute ₿0.1 on the understanding that they would receive ₿2-5 in five years’ time. There’s nothing like a guaranteed payout to ring those alarm bells. When investors began questioning his methods, which he described as “shooting against me”, he decided that those individuals would not get their money when the contract expired:
This funds will be used to finance my travel expenses to conferences. I will grant myself this funds as a compensation for shooting against me.
If it wasn’t enough that Bosak had outed him as a scammer, Bitcoin evangelist Andreas Antonopoulos and Bitcoin and Co. podcast host Anita Posch also took to Twitter to confirm his unscrupulous past. Even his ex-wife posted a Youtube video in November last year about Molt’s scams and lies, also Tweeting that “when the Bitcoin WP (whitepaper) was released, he didn’t even own a computer”. All in all, it seems that any remaining credibility Molt had left in the space has been shredded in the space of a few days, and anyone researching him now prior to potentially investing in his schemes should be better armed against his ways.
