Australia: Clients Take Crypto Fund Manager to Court, Cite $14.2 Million in Losses

The founder of what reportedly claims to be Australia's first online mattress retailer OzMattress and cryptocurrency fund manager Stefanos Papanastasiou is about to be brought to court by his clients over the loss of over AUD$20 million.

Per the report, Papanastasiou told his clients in 2017 that he had spent half a million Australian dollars to develop an algorithm that delivers substantial returns through the trading of Bitcoin and Ethereum-based tokens.

According to the claim filed by property developer Savvas Alexiadis, one of his clients, Papanastasiou owes him more than AUD$2.

The documents filed with the Supreme Court of Victoria state that Alexiadis transferred over AUD$2.

1 million into a Papanastasiou's trading account.

The documents also claim that Papanastasiou asked Alexiadis to transfer AUD$40,000 to his wife, AUD$35,000 to his sister and $450,000 to a mattress supplier in Thomastown, promising to send an equivalent in crypto assets.

The Age notes that Papanastasiou and his wife, Shalini Ganapathy, defaulted on the purchase of a AUD$5.

The website of Papanastasiou's mattress retail business, OzMattress, is seemingly offline at press time.

The claim also notes that Papanastasiou has repeatedly refused to provide an account of trading activity and did not comply with requests to repay the amounts asked by his clients.

Mark Thompson, a former Australian Football League coach accused of MDMA and methamphetamine trafficking in May last year, contributed over one million Australian dollars to Papanastasiou's fund as one of his clients.