The death of crypto king Nikolai Mushegian fuels conspiracy theories

A brilliant young cryptocurrency pioneer named Nikolai Mushegian tweeted on October 28 that intelligence agencies was going to kill him – and was found dead on a beach in Puerto Rico hours later.

“The CIA and Mossad and the pedo-elite are running some sort of sex-trafficking extortion ring from Puerto Rico and the Caribbean islands,” tweeted Mushegian, a blockchain-based decentralized finance platform developer who wanted to end global banking corruption, at 4:57 a.m. am “They’re going to hit me with a laptop planted by my ex [girlfriend] who was a spy. They want to torture me to death.”

The 29-year-old then left his $6 million beach house in the luxurious Condado neighborhood of San Juan, Puerto Rico, for a stroll. A little after 9 a.m., a surfer at Ashford Beach, a spot considered so full of riptides that local hotels warn against ocean swimming, discovered Mushegian’s body in the waves. He was wearing his clothes and had his wallet on him, sources told The Post.

News of Mushegian’s death, combined with his latest tweet and other, dark, posts about fighting “evil” people who were part of the “central banking cartel” – which he claimed used “debt and blackmail” as weapons—has fueled conspiracy theories online and in the close-knit cryptocurrency community in Puerto Rico.

“So Nikolai is still F–KING DEAD,” Ameen Soleimani, CEO of Spankchain, tweeted Oct. 3 “My money is on him being murdered. He was found drowned 4 hours after his most risque tweet ever. He had all year to accidentally drown or get robbed, so it seems unlikely that his death was unrelated to his tweet…”

“Mushegian … tweets 4 days ago about CIA, Mossad and pedo elites fearing for his life … Found dead yesterday … Pedo elites are real … why Epstein killed himself,” wrote Smoky Bear.

In September, Mushegian tweeted that there were “3 possible futures for me 1) suicide by CIA 2) CIA brain damage slave asset 3) worst nightmare of people who have been messing with me until now, I’m sure these are the only options.”

Mushegian was an early developer of Maker DAO, the largest decentralized finance (DeFi) protocol and was a key architect of stablecoin systems – currencies without government backing.

A person who knew Mushegian very well for years until they had an argument two years ago said the developer was “very very smart” but also suffered from extreme bouts of paranoia.

“He had mental health problems,” said the source, who spoke on condition of anonymity. “He saw a psychiatrist at times. He smoked a lot of pot. A huge amount.”

At the same time, the source said Meshugian was in communication with federal agencies, possibly including the CIA, but did not elaborate.

“Some of his paranoia was based on fact,” the source said. “He wanted to discover things. He knew things. Nikolai was very bored with the everyday life. He would go after things, constantly putting himself in strange positions. It wasn’t for the money. He was interested in why things were the way they were and the corruption behind it.”

The source described Mushegian as a loner who lived alone with his dog, Sunny, after a bad break-up with his girlfriend whom he called a “spy” in his latest tweet.

Another source said there is “no way” the ex-boyfriend was a spy. Posten has contacted the supposed ex for comment.

“He was a very quirky guy,” the source added of Mushegian. “He and I spent a lot of time together and I knew everything about him. He came across as cocky and arrogant, but that was just his autism. He was a big nerd, but he wouldn’t let anyone bully him. He had a collection of weapons – long guns, handguns, rifles. He liked guns and knew he wanted to protect himself. Maybe he knew too much, or he was going to reveal someone. He said exactly what was on his mind. He had no filter.”

But Brock Pierce, the “Mighty Ducks” child star turned cryptocurrency billionaire who pioneered the mass migration of cryptocurrency czars to Puerto Rico when he moved there in 2017, knew Mushegian and believes the death was simply a tragedy that may never be solved.

Pierce told The Post that he and others in the community were initially very “confused” about what may have happened to Mushegian when they first heard of his death.

So, after speaking with Mushegian’s Midwest-based family and others at the funeral in San Juan, he said he came to believe the drowning was neither accidental nor the result of foul play — suggesting it was self-inflicted. Multiple sources said Mushegian had been in such a “downward spiral” in recent weeks that his father had come to stay with him at his Condado home.

San Juan police told The Post that Mushegian’s death remains under investigation, but that it is not currently being considered a homicide.

“His mother explained that his death had nothing to do with him [conspiracy] tweets,” Pierce said. “He was a beautiful man and a child at heart. He was also an incredible visionary, I don’t call people brilliant very often, but Nikolai was brilliant. And brilliant people sometimes walk the edge of madness.”

Pierce told The Post Tuesday that Meshugian’s parents said he had been sober for the past six months and may have misjudged the beach surfing and been accidentally swept into the waves.

Cryptocurrency investor Michael Terpin, who was among the first wave of tech entrepreneurs to move to Puerto Rico even before Pierce, said he knew Mushegian and worked with him.

“He was a brilliant guy and I wouldn’t call him a tinfoil hat kind of person,” Terpin told The Post. “This is straight out of an episode of ‘The Blacklist.’ I know Nikolai liked to meditate in the morning, but I didn’t know he was the type to go out swimming like that, especially in such rough water. I see no way that this may have been an accident.”

Another friend in Puerto Rico who spoke on condition of anonymity said many feared Mushegian had committed suicide.

“He had stopped talking to people and became very withdrawn,” the friend told The Post. “I think his mental health got worse and he didn’t ask for help. He had shut himself down. I think unfortunately his [last] tweet was a really bold way to bring meaning to a suicide. Like, ‘How can I bring some nobility and meaning to my death?'”

Mushegian, aside from his darkest tweets, had long positioned himself as someone who helped bring a cleaner form of banking and finance to the world.

“Nikolai was working toward an incorruptible world, and he wanted there to be a separation between bank and state, just as there is a separation between church and state,” Pierce said. “He felt the world would be better off if central banks couldn’t print money and finance wars.”

Mushegian, a 2014 Carnegie Mellon graduate who donated $1.4 million to the school, frequently referenced the late Terry A. Davis, once called “God’s Lonely Programmer,” in his writings, as well as on his LinkedIn profile and website — sometimes even using Davis’ name as his own handle. Davis – who single-handedly created and designed a complex entire operating system, Temple OS – had a small cult following but also suffered from serious mental health issues including schizophrenia.

Davis died in August 2018 at the age of 48 after being struck and killed by a train in The Dalles, Oregon. The train engineer considered it a suicide, according to a police report.

“There was someone named Terry Davis,” Mushegian wrote in March. “Terry understood that the way big software companies made software was harmful to ordinary people. But he didn’t understand how to explain it to the people it was harming. To be sure he could never explain it in a way that people could understand, got the people who wanted to create malware on purpose that he hurt himself in ways he didn’t understand.”

Brock Pierce, who is running for president in 2020, told The Post that he had never heard of Terry Davis, but he was adamant that Mushegian’s death was not at the hands of sinister forces.

“Intelligence agencies are not hunting crypto pioneers,” he said. “If the government was shutting down people in this field, I would know.”