Behind the scenes of Tassie’s cryptocurrency millionaires
From industry heavyweights to teen geniuses and shysters cashing in on get-rich quick schemes, meet Tassie’s power players in the crypto game. FULL LIST >>
Tasmania
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Cryptocurrency acolytes insist that Tasmania is on the verge of a bitcoin boom, with two tech millionaires currently jostling to build the state’s largest large-scale mining operation in 2022.
Bitcoin is a notoriously energy-hungry form of digital cash, but crypto converts insist that Tasmania’s growing hydroelectricity capacity will fuel the rise in decentralised currency.
The Mercury has collated a list of Tassie’s power players in the crypto game, from industry heavyweights, to teen geniuses, to those whose exploits landed them in court.
Adam Poulton
Former Launceston City Councillor Adam Poulton is the driving force behind the crypto community in Northern Tasmania.
He launched Tasmania’s first Bitcoin ATM at Launceston’s Best Western Plus Hotel in 2015, back when it was a bizarre, fringe concept yet to enter the popular consciousness.
At the time of the ATM launch, one Bitcoin would be worth around $380 Australian. Today, it’s worth about $55,725AUD.
At its peak it was trading for upwards of $87,000AUD, but has been in free fall since November last year.
Despite this, Mr Poulton remains adamant that the future lies in Bitcoin.
“Get ready for another zero, people,” he confidently tweeted in December, while market sentiment was growing increasingly wary of anything vaguely crypto-related.
He is currently the president of the Bitcoin Association of Australia and founder of Get Paid In Bitcoin which, as the name implies, allows people to receive payments in Bitcoin.
Unlike other crypto millionaires who tend to lead secretive lives, Mr Poulton remains a vocal evangelist who holds Bitcoin meet-ups and seminars in Launceston.
In 2016 he also ran for the Tasmania Senate with the Flux Party, a rather geeky, techno futuristic party that advocates for app-based votes for direct democracy.
Alex Saunders
Once hailed as another Launceston crypto success story, YouTuber Alex Saunders became entangled in a bitter lawsuit against one of his former supporters.
His company Nugget News was founded in 2017 and rapidly rose in popularity, and he currently has 143,000 YouTube subscribers at time of writing.
What started as a modest YouTube channel grew into a popular website, podcast, and publishing platform where he dispensed his advice on cryptocurrency.
The Australian Financial Review estimates he was raking in $300,000 and $500,000 per month from his paid subscribers alone.
However his social media presence completely evaporated in 2021 when he became embroiled in a civil case in the Supreme Court of Victoria.
The court ordered him to pay back $490,000 to one of his followers Ziv Himmelfarb, who was convinced to lend Bitcoins and Ethereum to Mr Saunders for a supposed investment.
Mr Saunder’s investment pitch was for his upcoming “DCB Project” which, the court heard, was an unlicensed management investment scheme.
Mr Himmelfarb argued in court that he was convinced into lending the money to Mr Saunders on false pretences, and that he refused to give it back when asked.
He was the first follower to successfully recoup his losses in court, but the court noted Mr Saunders has borrowed millions of dollars to dozens of his former followers as well as friends and family.
Ben Simpson
As a teen prodigy, Ben Simpson dropped out of school at age 17 to start an online sports store and iPhone repair business from his bedroom, which he shared with his brother at the time.
He grew up in the North West Tasmanian coastal town of Smithton, where he came up with various money making schemes.
As a child he sold finger paintings and refereed basketball before starting his first official apparel business.
The entrepreneurial teenager met with moderate success until he began showing an interest in cryptocurrencies.
He went on to become the founder and CEO of Collective Shift, which researches and reports on developments in the cryptocurrency markets.
The company is only a year old, but currently generates over $2 million per year and continues to grow.
Now in his early 20s, Mr Simpson runs a team of over a dozen fully-grown adults, many of whom are established tech analysts.
On his Collective Shift website, Mr Simpson reflects on how far he’s come since his finger painting business.
“I grew up in a small town in Tasmania, Australia with just a few thousand people. Until I was about 10 years old my parents made minimum wage. Money was scarce. I was empowered to work for it, be creative, and find opportunities,” he said.
“One day, while building my apparel business, I learned about Bitcoin. I immediately saw its power and potential. And beyond the rational benefits of decentralisation, its deflationary nature, and permissionless, borderless qualities I intuitively felt something deeper.”
Oliver Curtis
Before he founded Launceston’s first bitcoin mine, Oliver Curtis was languishing in prison for a series of white collar crimes.
The multi-millionaire stockbroker was jailed in 2016 for insider trading which netted him and a friend $1.43 million.
Before his court case, Mr Curtis was mostly known as the husband of Roxy Jacenko, socialite, Instagram influencer, PR mogul, and a star of Celebrity Apprentice Australia.
Even to this day Mr Curtis is still mostly referred to as “Roxy Jacenko’s husband” by gossip magazines around Australia.
During his prison stint those gossip magazines sent photographers around to the Cooma Correctional Centre to snap pictures of him pacing up and down the jail yard.
After leaving prison in 2017 Mr Curtis went on to found Firmus, turning an old Launceston abattoir into a major supercomputing business.
Much of the old warehouse space has been turned into massive server rooms dedicated solely for bitcoin mining.
Firmus has announced its intention to become a public company, and could appear on the ASX sometime in 2022.
It has already attracted investment from the New Zealand company Powerhouse Ventures, which invests in “clean tech” and environmental start-ups.
Mr Curtis chose Tasmania specifically for its zero-emissions reputation and its Battery of the Nation program to further up its hydro-electric capacities.
Bitcoin mining has a notoriously bad reputation when it comes to greenhouse emissions, but Mr Curtis hopes that renewable energy could counteract that downside.
“Our vision is that our centres will be the first of their kind in Australia that can create a regional hub for supercomputing as well as provide base load and grid stabilisation services that are essential for the future investment into renewable energy,” he said in 2020.
“I am all in on investment into the state to support the growth and vision of becoming a leader in renewable generation and integration into the grid while supporting growth technology industries,” he said.
Cameron Nelson
Oliver Curtis could soon be facing some stiff competition from Cameron Nelson, who is planning to build a global-scale bitcoin mine in Northern Tasmania in 2022.
Mr Nelson is the CEO of Digital Asset Mining Enterprise (DAME), which is hoping to muscle in on Tasmania’s supercomputing market.
DAME also markets itself as a clean, green bitcoin mining company that relies on renewable energy to power its giant servers.
On its website the company’s mission statement is to “PARTNER NOT PARASITE” by creating sustainable value for all parties rather than parasitically draining resources.
Earlier this year Mr Nelson told The Australian that Tasmania stood to benefit immensely from a new cryptocurrency industry.
“We’re not coming out here and saying you can’t do other things in Tasmania; you can only do bitcoin mining. We are saying ‘how can we help?” Mr Nelson said.
“We are looking to provide a service on a scale that would mean that we are competitive on the world market.”
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