BC tribunal orders repayment of $3,000 crypto investment after no records
The applicant argued the respondent never invested the money at all and instead spent it on personal expenses. The respondent denied that, saying he had invested the funds but that they lost all their value.
The tribunal member did not have to decide who was right about personal spending. What mattered was evidence. The respondent, who represented himself, filed no financial records showing any investment or any loss. The tribunal noted that if the money had been invested, records would have been easy to produce.
That gap decided the case. Drawing what tribunals call an adverse inference – the principle that missing evidence can count against the party who should have had it – the member found the respondent had not shown he invested the money as required, and ordered him to repay the full $3,000.
The applicant did not win everything he sought. He had also claimed about $2,000 in profit he said the investment would have earned, bringing his capped claim to $5,000, the tribunal’s small claims limit. But the tribunal found he had not proved he directed any specific investment. His evidence pointed to Bitcoin, while the transfer records referenced “Pepe,” a memecoin. Because he could not show what he had actually asked for, the profit claim was dismissed.
A separate claim – $50 the applicant said he gave the respondent to pass to the respondent’s daughter as a birthday present – was also dismissed. The tribunal found the supporting evidence was hearsay and unreliable.
