Thodex: Turkey's Exchange CEO Fled With $2 Billion
On April 20, 2021, 391,000 Turkish crypto users discovered their exchange had vanished overnight. The CEO was on a flight to Albania.
On April 20, 2021, Turkish cryptocurrency exchange Thodex announced a brief trading halt for a "partnership deal." CEO Faruk Fatih Ozer posted that operations would resume in four or five days. Then he boarded a plane to Albania.
Thodex had 391,000 active users. Turkey was in the middle of a crypto boom driven by the lira's collapse. Citizens were using Bitcoin and stablecoins as a hedge against runaway inflation. Thodex was one of the country's largest exchanges. The shutdown triggered street protests and a political crisis.
Ozer was 22 years old when he founded Thodex in 2017 with 400,000 liras in capital. By 2021 he controlled an estimated $2 billion in customer funds. He carried a hardware wallet through airport security while fleeing the country. The police would not catch him for 16 months.
Interpol issued a red notice. Turkish authorities arrested 62 people connected to Thodex. Ozer's siblings were among them. He evaded capture across multiple countries before Albanian authorities detained him in August 2022. In April 2023, he was extradited to Turkey.
In September 2023, the Anatolian 9th Heavy Penal Court sentenced Ozer to 11,196 years, 10 months, and 15 days in prison - one for each count of aggravated fraud, one per victim. His brother and sister received the same sentence. A judicial fine of 135 million liras ($5 million) was also imposed. It was the longest sentence in Turkish legal history.
"I am smart enough to manage all institutions in the world," Ozer told the court. "If I were to establish a criminal organization, I would not act so amateurishly."
On November 1, 2025, Faruk Fatih Ozer was found dead in prison. Turkish prosecutors investigated. The death was confirmed as suicide. He was approximately 31 years old. He had served roughly two years of his 11,196-year sentence.
The $2 billion has never been recovered.
The Aftermath
Ozer was sentenced to 11,196 years - the longest in Turkish legal history. He died by suicide in prison on November 1, 2025. His brother and sister received identical sentences. The $2 billion in customer funds has never been found or recovered. Turkey introduced stricter crypto exchange regulations in the wake of the collapse.
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