On Wednesday, October 14, 2026, CBC reported that a real estate developer who invested more than $4.5 million with self-described “Crypto King” Aiden Pleterski told a Toronto jury he continued handing over money largely because he believed his holdings were growing rapidly.
Sacha Singh, who testified by video at Pleterski’s fraud trial in the Ontario Superior Court of Justice, said he met Pleterski, now 27, at a restaurant in Pickering, Ont., in spring 2021. Singh said he viewed the young trader as a potential “unicorn” in the cryptocurrency world. He made a first investment of $10,000 in cash that April.
The court was shown 22 additional contracts between the two men over the following 10 months. Together, they exceeded $4.5 million, with individual amounts ranging from $10,000 to $1.3 million. Wire transfer receipts backed most of them, while a few noted cash payments.
Singh’s total is the largest among the 11 investors the Crown has called so far. The other 10 collectively testified to giving Pleterski about $2.3 million, and most said they never recovered their money.
Singh, introduced to Pleterski by fellow investor Akil Heywood, said Pleterski sent weekly messages reporting percentage gains from foreign exchange and cryptocurrency trading. Singh tracked those figures in a spreadsheet shown in court. By March 2022, with weekly gains ranging from three to nearly 11 per cent, it indicated his investment had grown to more than $26 million. He said he never received those returns.
Singh did get some money back. When he asked in November 2021 to withdraw $1 million, he received $700,000, while the remaining $300,000 went to Pleterski as a trading fee under the contracts. Asked by Crown prosecutor Scott Patterson whether he would have kept investing had he known that sum came from his own earlier deposits, Singh answered, “No.”
Singh later recorded phone calls with Pleterski. In an April 2022 recording played in court, he asked whether the $700,000 came from the trading platform FXChoice or from other investors. Pleterski said it came from the platform, but that since February 2022 he had been paying returns from his own pocket because FXChoice was not paying him. In another recording, Pleterski said he was selling assets to pay people back.
Another investor, Mitchell Learning, testified last week that he visited Pleterski’s Burlington, Ont., home in June 2022 and found an email indicating the FXChoice account had been deleted. Learning said Pleterski then told him he had about $40 million in a trading account by September 2021, lost the rest on riskier trades, and began running a Ponzi scheme.
Pleterski, who is representing himself, has pleaded not guilty to fraud over $5,000 and money laundering. The Crown alleges he guaranteed investors’ money but never invested it, spending it on exotic cars, private jet flights and shopping. Pleterski did not cross-examine Singh or Learning, telling Justice Shaun Nakatsuru he lacked the legal knowledge to challenge inconsistencies.
He was arrested in May 2024 following an investigation by Durham Regional Police and the Ontario Securities Commission. The trial is expected to continue Friday.
Source: CBC
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