Ruja Ignatova

Ruja Ignatova
OneCoin company portrait of Ignatova, 2015
FBI Ten Most Wanted Fugitive
Reward$5,000,000
Description
BornRuzha Plamenova Ignatova
(1980-05-30) May 30, 1980
Ruse, Bulgaria
Nationality
  • Bulgarian (formerly)
  • German
Status
PenaltyUp to 90 years for the Ponzi scheme. 16 months' suspended imprisonment for a previous case.
StatusWanted by the ICPO and FBI
AddedJune 30, 2022
Number527
Currently a Top Ten Fugitive

Ruja Plamenova Ignatova (Bulgarian: Ружа Пламенова Игнатова, romanizedRuža Plamenova Ignatova, occasionally transliterated as "Ruga Ignatova"; born May 30, 1980 – disappeared October 25, 2017), also known by the nickname "Cryptoqueen", is a Bulgarian-German entrepreneur and con artist best known as one of the FBI Ten Most Wanted Fugitives, and as the founder of the fraudulent cryptocurrency scheme OneCoin, which The Times described as "one of the biggest scams in history." She was the subject of the 2019 BBC podcast series The Missing Cryptoqueen and the 2022 book of the same name. Ignatova boarded a Ryanair flight from Sofia to Athens on October 25, 2017, and has not been seen since.

Since her disappearance, Ignatova has long been presumed to be on the run from various international law enforcement agencies. The FBI has offered up to five million dollars for any information leading to her arrest. On March 7, 2019, an indictment was unsealed in which the United States charges Ignatova with wire fraud, securities fraud and money laundering. The FBI added Ignatova to the Ten Most Wanted Fugitives list in June 2022. Ignatova is the subject of an Interpol warrant issued by German authorities.

Reporting in 2023 and 2024 suggested that Ignatova may have been murdered in 2018 on the orders of Bulgarian organised crime figure "Taki" Hristoforos Nikos Amanatidis, who is suspected of initially sheltering her.