Nikolai Mushegian, co-founder of the cryptocurrency lending platform MakerDAO and the decentralized Dai (DAI) stablecoin, was discovered lifeless in Puerto Rico final week.
Mushegian died attributable to drowning after being dragged by sea currents on the Condado seaside in San Juan, the native newspaper El Nuevo Día reported. Mushegian had no important indicators by the point his physique was rescued.
The Condado seaside is taken into account one of many world’s most harmful locations for swimmers, reportedly taking the lives of a minimum of eight individuals in 2021.
The unlucky occasion was reported to native authorities on the morning on Oct. 28. In response to a police report, Mushegian was a resident of San Juan. The scene was reportedly investigated by the San Juan Murder Division and an area prosecutor.
Mushegian was an essential determine within the cryptocurrency group, contributing to a number of business tasks, with some referring to him as a “Dai architect.” The 29-year-old crypto developer is understood for his work with MakerDAO forks Rico and Rai, in addition to the proof-of-stake blockchain community BitShares. Mushegian can also be a co-founder of the automated market maker Balancer.
MakerDAO founder and CEO Rune Christensen took to Twitter on Oct. 31 to say that Mushegian contributed essential inputs to Maker’s growth and has accomplished some essential work because the early days of Ethereum.
Nikolai was one of many solely individuals within the early days of Ethereum and sensible contracts who was in a position to predict the opportunity of sensible contract hacks and invented the security-oriented strategy to sensible contract design we all know right this moment. Maker would have been toast with out him
— Rune (@RuneKek) October 31, 2022
Cardano founder Charles Hoskinson wrote on Twitter that he knew Mushegian from again within the BitShares days. “He was a really younger and very brilliant man who had a really big selection of pursuits from recreation concept to Urbit,” Hoskinson mentioned, including that the coder had a deep understanding of know-how.
Tether co-creator Craig Sellars noted that Mushegian’s demise got here only a few days after the MakerDAO group voted to approve custody of $1.6 billion in USD Coin (USDC) with the Coinbase crypto trade.
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Mushegian was an energetic group member on social media. His Twitter account, Delete_shitcoin, has about 5,500 followers on the time of writing. His final tweet was published only a few hours earlier than his demise, referring to options of alleged blackmail from the US Central Intelligence Company and Mossad. Mushegian beforehand made related statements on Twitter, hinting at a possible “suicide” by the CIA as one in every of his attainable futures.