Furious customers of Auckland-based cryptocurrency exchange Dasset say they are unable to access their funds - and the firm is not responding to complaints.
The Herald talked to an online group formed by disgruntled Dasset customers. Its 16 members - and counting - say they have been locked out of accounts holding between $3000 and $40,000.
One customer who has been unable to withdraw $40,000 after three months of trying told the Herald she was the mother of two young boys.
“This was our entire life savings, [which] we were counting on, and now we are facing a very dire situation,” she said.
Suppliers and minority shareholders are also out of pocket. Customers and suppliers have not been able to reach shareholder, CEO and sole director Stephen Macaskill for months.
In a text message to the Herald last night, Macaskill said Dasset has gone into voluntary liquidation.
“Dasset has not had stable banking since January. The banks do not like the crypto industry.”
The Herald understands Dasset’s banking provider pulled its service in January, and the company was unable to gain a replacement.
Macaskill did not respond to follow-up questions, but liquidator Grant Thornton managing partner Russell Moore confirmed to the Herald he and his colleague David Ruscoe have been appointed liquidators.
“Dasset’s management says a significant reduction in asset values and trading levels impacted its ability to trade profitably. It was determined the appointment of liquidators was in the best interests of all stakeholders,” Grant Thornton says in a notice on its website.
“The liquidators’ immediate focus is on securing and protecting Dasset’s asset,” the notice says.
And although the request is largely academic, given most or all users had access to their account disabled while Dasset was still in regular trading, the liquidators have asked customers not to make any more deposits. They have also warned, “We will not allow any withdrawals until our investigation is complete.”
Users are concerned that their holdings are intact, but the liquidators say they cannot confirm balances at this time.
Moore and Ruscoe will spend the next few days getting the lay of the land. They expect to make their first report next week. Affected customers are asked to get in touch.
The Grant Thornton pair are also the liquidators for Christchurch-based crypto exchange Cryptopia, where investigations are now into their fifth year.
The Herald understands there was an extraordinary meeting of Dasset shareholders on August 7 where Macaskill - the largest shareholder, with a 40 per cent stake - was pressed for information. After he failed to provide answers, according to an investor familiar with events, a resolution was passed to appoint a voluntary liquidator.
Agustin (Leo) D’Ambrosio, who works in the IT industry in Wellington, told the Herald he had around $20,000 of the cryptocurrency Ethereum trapped with Dasset. For the past five months he, like other customers, had been seeing a “user is disabled” message when he tried to log on.
When he emailed tech support - because phone numbers had been removed from Dasset’s site - responses first cited unspecified “technical issues”, “banking issues” and “unforeseen complexities”, which the firm said would take several weeks to resolve. More recently, responses have stopped altogether.
One customer who could not access an account holding the equivalent of $6000 in Bitcoin said she received the funds after complaining to Macaskill - but also that she was never able to regain access to her Dasset account. She said the CEO direct-credited $6000 to her bank account.
Another member of the group had been trying to withdraw just under $5000 since April 26.
“This has been a slow-moving train wreck for many months. I have Bitcoin on the exchange and have been completely ghosted by the company,” one customer said. His last response was in June.
Another complained: “It’s unacceptable that they appear open for business as usual”.
Dasset has not published any information on its customer numbers.
An unpaid tech supplier told the Herald the exchange had signed up around 30 new customers a month over a three-year period.
One customer, Charles Knight, who told the Herald he had been trying unsuccessfully to withdraw $47,000 since March, noted: “While Dasset has issues regarding access to regular banking, they could have let customers withdraw their crypto and send it to another crypto wallet outside of Dasset - as any other crypto trading platform allows, except Dasset wouldn’t allow that.”
Dasset, registered as Digital Asset Exchange, promoted that it was a member of the Insurance and Financial Services Ombudsman (Ifso) Scheme.
Several members of the disgruntled customer group had lodged complaints with the Ifso.
The Herald has sighted a series of emails from the Ifso to Macaskill. One notes that he promised to unlock a customer’s account by 6pm on July 12 but did not.
Another, on July 24, said it was the third escalation of a customer’s complaint since May, and requested he contact the complainant by close of business on July 25.
Shortly afterward, the customer was sent an email by the Ifso saying: “The Insurance and Financial Services Ombudsman (Ifso) Scheme has recently terminated Dasset’s participation in the Ifso Scheme.” The agency could no longer help, given Dasset was no longer a member.
Was Dasset kicked out? A spokeswoman for the Ifso told the Herald it could not comment other than to say Dasset was no longer part of the scheme. “Any further inquiries should be directed to the Financial Markets Authority [FMA].”
On the face of things, Dasset’s withdrawal - or ejection - from the Ifso put it foul of NZ’s financial sector regulator.
The FMA website says New Zealand-based trading platforms have to belong to a dispute resolution scheme.
An FMA spokesman said the authority could not comment beyond what the Ifso had said.
Crypto entrepreneur Fran Strajnar, who is a minority investor in Dasset - through a direct 2 per cent stake, and as one of the shareholders in crypto investment firm Techemy, which has a 33 per cent stake in Dasset - told the Herald he was in the same boat as angry customers.
“I have $230,000 stuck on the platform,” Strajnar said.
The investor said he had offered Macaskill advice and support in Dasset’s early days - the firm was registered in 2015 - but he had not had any active involvement since 2020 and had never had an operational role. He resigned as a director this year.
When he spoke to the Herald this week, Strajnar had not heard from Macaskill for days.
In June 2020, Dasset announced a partnership with the Seattle-based Bittrex - at the time, one of the largest cryptocurrency exchanges in the US.
“We are excited to establish a partnership with Bittrex – one of the most trusted and liquid digital asset exchanges in the world. Traditionally, Australasian investors have had difficulty accessing digital assets due to the high fees and low liquidity among exchanges. With this partnership, Dasset and Bittrex can bring international standards to the Oceania region in terms of pricing, fees and selection,” Macaskill said at the time.
“Dasset’s vision is to support a sound financial system by empowering individuals with access, choice and sovereignty over their wealth – and with Bittrex’s commitment, we are now one step closer to fulfilling this.”
Bittrex filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy on May 5 this year. The firm claimed the regulatory environment in the US had become overbearing after the FTX scandal that led to founder Sam Bankman-Fried being jailed last week for defrauding users out of millions and attempted witness tampering.
A month before the Bittrex bankruptcy, the US Securities and Exchange Commission filed charges, alleging misuse of customer funds and unlicensed, illegal trading. Four days ago, Bittrex agreed to pay US$24m to settle the charges. Earlier, on June 15, a court allowed Bittrex to reopen for withdrawals.
Macaskill did not respond to questions about any of the impacts of Bittrex’s problems.
Complainants to the Ifso were referred to the FMA.
A spokesman for the regulator said: “The FMA generally does not comment on whether or not it is investigating specific entities. However, it is aware of issues raised in your query [on customers being unable to withdraw funds and Dasset not responding to complaints]. We are unable to provide any further comment at this stage.”
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Three Dasset customers told the Herald they had emailed the FMA over June and July, but so far had only received an auto-response acknowledging that they had been in contact with the financial sector enforcer.
OriginID was previously featured on Dasset’s site as a partner. The Auckland firm makes “on-boarding software” that helps a service provider sign up and register new customers.
Founder and CEO David Langeveldt said: “We provided a solution to verify their customers for a number of years, but we have not been able to get in touch with them for the past 12 months. They have not paid any bills or responded to any communications from us.
“We terminated the agreement seven months ago, but are still owed money by them - by no means near as much as I suspect some of the people that had money with them.”
The Ifso said it could not comment on any of the complaints nor the circumstances under which Dasset left the Ifso, because it was no longer a participant.
Dasset’s home page carries a message that it is “supervised by the New Zealand Department of Internal Affairs (DIA)”.
The DIA referred questions to other agencies.
A DIA spokeswoman said: “Dasset is supervised for AML/CFT purposes only under the Anti-Money Laundering and Countering Financing of Terrorism Act 2009. It is important to note that the department, as the AML/CFT supervisor, does not regulate or respond to consumer complaints.”
The FMA said it had no further comment at this time. The regulator’s general advice is that “cryptocurrencies are high-risk, speculative product”.
Dasset’s central Auckland office was locked and empty when the Herald visited. The Herald also visited the apartment building listed as Macaskill’s most recent address on the Companies Office, in a filing dated August 7. The building manager said the Dasset director had moved out three months ago.
Chris Keall is an Auckland-based member of the Herald’s business team. He joined the Herald in 2018 and is the technology editor and a senior business writer.
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