Bitcoin Billionaire of Polish Origin Drowns in Costa Rica

Only a week after the demise of John McAfee, a crypto promoter and a well-known personality in the crypto business, supposedly died. Mircea Popescu, who has nearly $1 billion in Bitcoin in custody, dubbed the “Bitcoin Whale,” drowned near the coast of Costa Rica.

He was observed heading into the sea to swim at the Tramonto Sector about 8:00 a.m., and the mishap occurred within few minutes. Popescu, 41, was identified after an inquiry by Costa Rica’s Judicial Investigation Agency. He is of Polish ancestry, but is a well-known Romanian, according to authorities.

Authorities have issued cautions against swimming in the region, according to local media, since the ocean current appears to be ferocious. Tourists and bathers are reminded by lifeguards on Jaco Beach that Paya Hermosa is not really a swimming spot. Popescu is credited with establishing Polimedia, a Romanian enterprise resource planning company, in 2007.

He began blogging on the Trilema blog in Romanian in 2008, before switching to English in 2012 when he started to write about cryptocurrency. Popescu is said to have sold SatoshiDice for 25,000 BTC in 2013. He also ran the now-defunct MPEx stock, bond, and options exchange, which he created in 2012.

Popescu was a tenacious crypto adherent who had a greater say in just about all crypto-related matters. Popescu “trolled the SEC harsher than anybody else in history,” as per Bitcoin investor Roger Ver. Around 2016, Popescu and a team of Bitcoin Asset IRC minarchists challenged the intention of changing the Bitcoin block size from 1 MB to 2 MB.

If any changes were made, they vowed to sell the asset for $1 million. Gavin Andresen, the primary coder of the Bitcoin core node client at the time, was unable to persuade Popescu. Following news of his death, the crypto community has been wondering what would happen to his possessions. In case it gets inherited, will that get liquidated by the new owner?