Matthew Mellon, a banking heir who saw his $2 million investment in XRP, Ripple’s cryptocurrency, explode into a billion dollar fortune, learned first-hand the dangers associated with earning perceived easy money. The morning following a night of festivities at his Los Angles party pad, the 54-year-old says he discovered four individuals rooting around his home. Mellon did not file a report with police and guesses the unwanted intruders were after his XRP. Though they stole two cellphones and four laptops, they were not able to loot Mellon’s cryto-fortune, which is carefully hidden in various locations. While not all of the individuals comprising Forbes’s list of the most crytpo-affluent have such dramatic tales to tell, the incident serves to underscore the unique nature of both the crytocurrency boom and its beneficiaries.
See Jeff Kauflin, Forbes’ First List of Cryptocurrency’s Richest: Meet the Secretive Freaks, Geeks and Visionaries Minting Billions from Bitcoin Mania, Forbes, February 7, 2018.
Special thanks to Jim Hillhouse (Professional Legal Marketing (PLM)) for bringing this article to my attention.
