Sunday, October 26, 2025

The Devil Wears Bitcoin

The Devil Takes Bitcoin:
 Cryptocurrency Crimes and the Japan Connection 

by Jake Adelstein
author of Tokyo Vice and The Last Yazuza

Released October 14, 2025

Even in hell, Bitcoin talks. This modern take on an old Japanese saying still holds true. Cryptocurrency was supposed to do for money what the internet did for information, but it didn’t work out that way. Its virtual existence unleashed real-world chaos — especially in the homeland of its mysterious creator, Satoshi Nakamoto. Tokyo was the centre of the world’s largest bitcoin exchange, Mt. Gox, until that company collapsed with nearly half a billion dollars’ worth of bitcoin gone missing. It might be the greatest heist in history. If it was a heist.

So what really happened? Here’s the true story of the humble-to-hot commodity, from the former geek website that launched the boom to an inside world of absent-minded CEOs, hucksters, hackers, cybercrooks, drug dealers, corrupt federal agents, evangelical libertarians, and clueless techies. You’ll discover Bitcoin’s connection to the infamous Silk Road, learn why hell has nothing on Japan’s criminal justice system, and get the lowdown on the high cost of betting with the Devil’s dollars. All of this for less than the price of a single bitcoin.

BOOK TOUR UPCOMING 2025

Los Angeles, CA

November 4: Book Soup, 7 pm

Palo Alto, CA

November 6: Northern California Japan Society (Palo Alto), 3 pm

Boston, MA

November 8: Japan Society and Boston University with BU’s Center for the Study of Asia 3 pm


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