'Crypto King' investor recounts the moment he learned $311M investment fund didn’t exist

Testimony from Mitchell Learning, an investor and friend of Aiden Pleterski, offered an inside view of the collapse of Pleterski's investment business at his fraud and money laundering trial in Toronto's Ontario Superior Court, according to CBC. Learning, who said he invested $400,000, testified on the fourth day of the trial that he visited Pleterski's lakefront mansion in Burlington, Ont., in June 2022 to see proof of the $311 million balance Pleterski had shown him in a screenshot and video. Pleterski was not home, so Learning accessed his email on a computer and found a message from trading platform FXChoice confirming the account where the $311 million was supposed to be had been "successfully deleted." Account statements from another platform, Forex.com, were also found. A friend who recorded a video of the emails remarked that the account balance "never been higher than $1,000," and the "available margin" was about $400. Both the screenshot and video were shown to the jury.

Learning testified that Pleterski later gave him a different account of events, saying trading had gone well until the summer of 2021 and that he held about $40 million around September 2021. Losses followed as Pleterski took on riskier trades, and Learning said Pleterski then began running a Ponzi scheme. Two days after the visit, Learning recorded a 30-minute phone call with Pleterski, played in court, in which Pleterski expressed regret and said he would "make it right" to return investors' money. Pleterski did not cross-examine Learning, saying he was "unable to come up with questions for the witness."

The Crown alleges Pleterski guaranteed investors' funds for trading but never invested them, instead spending the money on exotic cars, private jet flights, luxury shopping and credit card bills in the millions. Learning said he first gave Pleterski $2,500 in September 2020, that his stake grew to $400,000, and that he withdrew just over $1 million at one point, some of which he passed to family and friends seeking their principal. Pleterski was arrested in May 2024 after a lengthy investigation by Durham Regional Police and the Ontario Securities Commission, and police allege he operated a multimillion-dollar Ponzi scheme. The trial is expected to continue.