Bitcoin Trader Robbed and Pushed Out of Car in Hong Kong

Hong-Kong
5 January 2021

Hong Kong police are searching for robbers who lured a trader into a meeting on Monday and stole cash and bitcoin before pushing him out of a car.

  • The criminals tricked the 37-year-old man into a meeting outside a hotel in North Point on Monday, where two men arrived in a car to pick up the victim, the South China Morning Post reported on Tuesday.
  • Police said the trader had chatted to the men online before agreeing to the meeting in-person to sell the men 15 BTC.
  • The trader was paid around HK$3 million (almost US$387,000) in cash in the car after he'd transferred the bitcoin to the two buyers, said the report, citing a police source.
  • The men then drove the trader an estimated 6 kilometers where they met another three men before forcing him out of the car on a Hong Kong hillside.
  • The man was not injured, but the cash and two mobile phones were stolen, per the report.
  • The 15 BTC at a price of around $31,000 on Monday would have been worth US$465,000, meaning approximately US$852,000 was stolen in total.

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