Steal Crypto, Buy Pokémon
Technology has infected our economy with unprecedented stupidity
“The real problem is not whether machines think but whether men do.” – B.F. Skinner
There is no explaining why some humans will ascribe insane values to Pokémon trading cards – or something even dumber called U92 tokens – but they do.
Earlier this week, federal prosecutors charged a Rockville, Md. man for allegedly stealing more than $50 million by hacking an obscure crypto exchange and using the loot to buy Pokémon.
You know them, right? Pikachu, Charizard, Mewtwo and Lugia? How about U92?
“Crypto is all fake internet money anyway,” Jonathan Spalletta, 36, told a friend as he explained his heist, according to the indictment.
Crypto may be fake. Prison time is not. Spalletta, who has surrendered to authorities, faces up to 20 years in prison. He has yet to enter a plea.
Put yourself in his shoes for a moment. Imagine you found a button on an ATM that emptied its contents right into your lap. Would you push it?
This is what Spalletta allegedly discovered at Uranium Finance, which had about as much in deposits as Spalletta allegedly nabbed. After the exploit, it shut down almost immediately.
Spalletta then allegedly laundered the loot through crypto mixers like Tornado Cash, a sketchy privacy platform that obscures the source and destination of cryptocurrency transactions.
And then … this is where Ocean’s Eleven starts to look more like a teenager’s bedroom.
Prosecutors say Spalletta purchased a $750,000 Pokémon set, $257,000 in Pokémon booster boxes, a $500,000 BlackLotus card, and 18 packs of sealed “Alpha Booster” Magic Cards for more than $1.5 million.
He also bought a $137,500 scrap of cloth from the original Wright brothers plane that Neil Armstrong flew to the surface of the moon and back, as well as a cache of ancient Roman coins. (Can you believe Pokémon is worth more than the Wright brothers and Neil Armstrong combined? How stupid are we?)
No mansions. No Ferraris. Not even trips to private islands. Just a very expensive hobby collection that would fit neatly inside a prison cell, if he’s convicted.
Too bad Spalletta can’t take it with him. Law enforcement already seized it along with $31 million in crypto in February 2025.
As for Uranium Finance, it wasn’t even a company. It didn’t have executives or even anyone guarding the vault.
It was just an algorithm that attracted deposits by offering its own made-up reward token, U92. People put in their real crypto and earned obscure tokens whose value depended on the system working.
But the system didn’t work. And prosecutors say Spalletta figured out the flaw faster than anyone.
Yes, smart technology makes for dumb money. In the old days, an ATM might hold $200,000 for a lucky hacker. Today, we also have crypto exchanges that hold millions and will keep spilling treasure if you press the right button.
Spalletta didn’t just hack Uranium Finance once, according to the indictment. He hacked it repeatedly. Here’s how prosecutors say he did it:
