How Josip Heit sold dreams of quick wealth while regulators worldwide warned of illegal crypto schemes
- 16.12.2025 08:14
Amid the Covid-19 pandemic in June 2020, Josip Heit, a businessman from Croatia, was parked in front of the Marriott hotel in Bucharest, ready to meet an Antena Stars journalist, driving a Bugatti Chiron Panda estimated at four million euros.
Heit explains, in broken English, how he became wealthy: he grew up in a poor family in the former Yugoslavia, and at 18 he began studying tourism management. He later founded a company providing tourism and luxury services. He claims to have more than 200,000 direct and indirect employees worldwide. In Romania, he says, he owns several companies.
“Several” in fact means just one — effectively none. One month after the Antena Stars interview, the only company in which Heit was a shareholder in Romania, Joh Properties Invest SRL, was declared fiscally inactive.
The Antena Stars clip reveals another connection to Romania: for a few seconds, Alex Bodi appears on camera, smiling, behind the wheel of another car. He is well known in the tabloid world for his relationship with Bianca Drăgușanu.
The two men frequently appear together on social media, and Bodi has a link on his Instagram profile that redirects to the DAO1 website, described as a decentralized platform running on the Apertum blockchain.
Bodi’s role in the DAO1 Apertum business is unclear. What is certain is that the scheme has drawn the attention of authorities in several countries.
WHY IT MATTERS: Social media users are exposed daily to promises of quick wealth through investments, but most often they end up as victims and lose their money.
In October 2025, Germany’s financial supervisory authority (BaFin) issued a warning, stating that DAO1 was being promoted in Germany without authorization through local events, webinars, and social media. The platform allegedly offered automated crypto-asset trading using artificial intelligence.
“There are facts that justify the presumption that DAO1 is offering crypto-asset services without authorization in Germany,” the institution wrote in the warning published on its website.
Authorities in Australia and New Zealand also issued warnings.
In March 2025, U.S. authorities issued a cease-and-desist order against Apertum (APTM) regarding a token traded in Texas by Josip Heit and his business partners. The order was later revoked.
However, Josip Heit, his partners, and connected companies had already come under the scrutiny of authorities in the United States and Canada as early as the end of 2023.
At that time, the Texas State Securities Board blocked the activity of GSB Gold Standard Group over another scheme: investors put money into digital products and earned more if they brought in additional investors. In short, multi-level marketing or a Ponzi scheme.
“Create wealth for future generations”
Companies controlled by Heit and his partners organized grand events in Dubai and South Africa, with thousands of participants. Celebrities such as Roberto Carlos, former Real Madrid player, and Floyd Mayweather, former boxer, were used to recommend, promote, and support their activities.
But things went further, with companies registered in multiple jurisdictions, and the scheme also involving a supposedly licensed bank in the Comoros Islands (located between Madagascar and the African continent).
The GSB group sold XLT vouchers representing fractional ownership in apartments in G999 Tower, a luxury building in Dubai: “a glorious 36-story skyscraper located in the heart of Dubai,” which is “inspired by desert winds and radiates grandeur as it shines under the blazing sun.”
The vouchers were converted into “XLT” tokens that ultimately became worthless. The price fell from 9.63 USDT (a stable cryptocurrency) to 0.0000049 USDT per token.
Companies connected to Heit also promoted Lydian World, a virtual world where people could buy land, build buildings, or open businesses, but first had to purchase another token called LYS.
GS Partners traded Elemental certificates (or Elemental MetaCertificates), bearing symbolic names inspired by natural elements, promising substantial returns depending on the amount initially invested. In October 2023, the certificates began recording trading losses, and GSP informed investors to expect reduced profits — or to deposit even more money.
In September 2024, U.S. and Canadian authorities reached an agreement with the GSB group led by Josip Heit. The group was required to return all money and cryptocurrencies to investors.
The official statement notes that investors were recruited through meetings in churches, hotels, and online (Zoom, Facebook Live), using phrases such as “the best opportunity on the planet,” “create wealth for future generations,” or “let your money work for you.”
The problems
Josip Heit presents himself today as a successful man on Instagram, where he has more than half a million followers. However, his past paints a very different picture.
He was born in Split, a city on Croatia’s Adriatic coast. He is 47 years old and previously used the name Curcic. In 2009, he married Kristina Heit, whose surname he adopted, and that same year he was arrested in Luxembourg for theft.
He was later sentenced by judges to six years in prison and fined 5,000 euros for being part of an organized crime group that targeted elderly people withdrawing money from Luxembourg banks. He was released early, in 2012.
Heit became visible in 2018, when he appeared at the launch of Karatbars. The company offered a token allegedly backed by physical gold.
The event in Germany was also attended by Ovidiu Florin Toma, according to images posted on YouTube.
Earlier this year, CryptoData, Toma’s company, was searched by prosecutors from Romania’s DNA anti-corruption unit. The press reported that Toma is allegedly the godson of General Florian Coldea, the former head of the Romanian Intelligence Service (SRI).
“Neither I nor my company have been informed that we have any status in a DNA criminal case, and we do not know the purpose for which DNA requested documents from our headquarters, in February 2025 (…)” Toma told us, denying any family relationship with the general.
We asked him how he ended up in Josip Heit’s circle. He replied by email that he had a contractual relationship starting in 2018, with his company supplying phones, laptops, and IT services.
He was supposed to produce and deliver around 30,000 phones, but later learned that GSB and Karatbars “put up for sale more than 75–80,000 units, thus harming good-faith customers who purchased the products at retail,” Toma told us, adding that he lost money.
“At the time the collaboration was terminated, GSB had outstanding payments to us and our suppliers totaling more than 7 million euros, amounts that have not been paid to this day.”
However, images on social media show that Toma also attended parties with Josip Heit. In one of the photos, Andrew Tate appears alongside the two men.
Screenshot: Facebook, Josip Heit’s account.
Asked by journalist Denise Rifai whether the Karatbars business was the biggest “hit” he had ever pulled off, Alex Bodi answered yes, then explained that it was neither his company nor Josip Heit’s, and that they were simply portrayed in a bad light.
The Karatbars business had also come to the attention of the Central Bank of Namibia, which in 2019 suspected it of illegal pyramid financial schemes. Warnings were also issued by authorities in New Zealand, South Africa, and Canada.
Also in 2019, Germany’s financial supervisory authority shut down the Karatbars business through an order. The Belize-registered company Karatbit was selling a token without holding a license. The tokens later collapsed.
“These are classic pyramid/Ponzi schemes under the guise of cryptocurrencies. They combine a multi-level marketing structure (where participants earn money by recruiting new investors) with the sale of unregistered securities, promises of ‘gold backing’ or other tangible assets, and promises of unrealistic returns without any real economic activity behind them.
In cases such as KBC or GSB Group, promises of ‘asset protection’ with gold or skyscrapers are often completely false — either the gold does not exist at all, or it is a symbolic amount that cannot cover the value of the issued tokens,” said Nikola Skoric, founder and CEO of Electrocoin, a Croatian crypto brokerage and payment processing company, speaking to OSTRO reporters.
Recently, OSTRO journalists also asked Croatian prosecutors whether there are criminal proceedings against Heit or his companies. The response was that the Split prosecutor’s office is investigating possible money laundering offenses.
From abandoned schools to luxury penthouses
Over the past few years, Josip Heit has accumulated real estate in at least three countries.
Kaštela, near Split, Croatia. He owns land and an old building that he purchased in 2019 for more than €940,000, but his name is also linked to other local companies that own real estate as well.
Dubai, United Arab Emirates. Heit’s name appears in Dubai Uncovered, a data leak that revealed property owners. According to the data, Heit owns or has owned several apartments and office spaces, purchased for more than €21 million. They were bought two years ago, and some have already been sold, according to information obtained by OCCRP.
Romania. In previous years, Heit made several acquisitions.
In 2018, he bought a former evangelical school in the village of Seleuș, Mureș County. According to a local source, the building is in an advanced state of decay and taxes have not been paid.
The following year, he paid more than €1 million for a penthouse and two parking spaces. The apartment is located on the 25th floor of an Asmita Gardens building, a residential complex on the banks of the Dâmbovița River, next to the Văcărești Natural Park in Bucharest.
Also in 2019, Heit paid another €2.2 million for a two-story villa on Londra Street in Bucharest, in a neighborhood with embassies. He then began renovating it.
The renovation handover in 2020 was attended by Ion Mihai Macaveiu, acting as site supervisor on behalf of the owner. Macaveiu was the leader of PSD Mediaș, a local councilor, and a state secretary in the Ministry of Economy.
Reached by phone, Macaveiu confirmed that he was involved in the renovation of the building. He said he knows Alex Bodi from Mediaș and that he was classmates with Ovidiu Cocoș, with whom he remained friends. “I have never met Josip Heit,” he added.
In 2022, Heit exchanged the villa for an apartment valued at €282,000 and additionally received €1.35 million.
A real estate agency that brokered the exchange contract asked the court to annul it, arguing that “the price was fraudulently reduced in order to evade taxes owed to the state (…) the declared value of the properties is far below their real value.” The agency later dropped the lawsuit because court fees were too high.
Also in 2022, Heit sold the apartment obtained in the exchange and received €1.08 million for it.
The Bucharest transactions are linked to two other key figures: Alex Bodi and Ovidiu Cocoș. Both represented Josip Heit in the Bucharest real estate transactions through notarized powers of attorney, and the latter even received money from one of them.
Alexandru Nicolae Bodi was born in Mediaș, Sibiu County. In Romania, according to entries in the Official Gazette, he is a shareholder in five companies. Two are fiscally inactive, and the other three are operating at a loss.
In November 2020, he was detained by DIICOT prosecutors in a case involving organized crime and human trafficking. According to documents obtained by Public Record, Bodi was a “lieutenant” of underworld figure Adrian Tîmplaru. Bodi recruited young women using the “loverboy” method and took them to Germany to engage in prostitution: “At the time of recruitment, the defendant also exploited the victims’ obvious state of vulnerability (naivety, family problems, material deprivation, lack of education),” prosecutors wrote in the indictment.
The document also shows that Bodi and Tîmplaru had a close relationship with Werner Kirschner, a German citizen of Romanian origin who left Mediaș in the 1980s. The man is a prominent leader of the Hells Angels group in Germany, where he manages several nightclubs in which prostitution takes place.
In 2021, the case reached the court, but judges decided to send it back to prosecutors. The indictment was resubmitted to the Sibiu Tribunal in 2022, where it remains in the preliminary chamber. In other words, judges have been struggling for three years to decide whether the criminal trial can begin.
In addition to this case, DIICOT told us that prosecutors are also conducting investigations in another matter in which Bodi’s name appears, but at this stage the investigation concerns only the acts, not specific suspects.
Ovidiu Cocoș, a relative of Lia Savonea, the head of Romania’s High Court of Cassation and Justice, is also mentioned in the case in which Bodi was sent to trial. Prosecutors describe him as “a trusted person of the defendant.”
According to the indictment, Cocoș allegedly tried to help Bodi remove two Lamborghinis from seizure.
A Lamborghini Aventador with license plate SB-60-BDI, which was found in Bodi’s yard during prosecutors’ searches, was allegedly sold by Cocoș to a company in the Czech Republic for €340,000. Cocoș had purchased it himself from GSB Gold Standard Banking Corporation AG in Germany, according to the sales contract obtained by Public Record. That is, from one of the companies connected to Josip Heit, which has also drawn the attention of U.S. financial regulators.
Prosecutors further describe that Bodi also tried to remove a Lamborghini Urus from seizure, again with Cocoș’s help. The car had been purchased through a preliminary sale agreement in 2019 from Exigent Development SRL. Registered in Bucharest, the vehicle for a time also carried a license plate ending in BDI.
One of Exigent’s associates, Cornel Petruț Ion, known as Magiunică, is the subject of a criminal case, being suspected of tax evasion. The case has not yet been sent to trial, but it also involves five ANAF officials.
According to information obtained by Public Record, Cocoș also owns a Bentley Continental and a Ferrari Pista. Both have personalized license plates ending in GSB.
Bodi also owns a Rolls-Royce and a Cadillac Escalade.
The Mediaș hotel. Before the criminal issues emerged, Josip Heit and Alex Bodi purchased the Central Hotel in Mediaș. The total price was €1.7 million. Both were represented before the notary by Ovidiu Cocoș.
In December 2023, Alex Bodi sold his share and received in exchange a Bentley Continental and €450,000. One month later, Josip Heit also sold the remaining part of the hotel for €1 million.
From Central SA, the company that initially owned the Mediaș hotel, Ovidiu Cocoș also bought the basement with eight storage cellars of a building on Mihai Eminescu Street. He paid €10,000 in 2019.
In 2022, Ovidiu Cocoș sold a plot of land in Mediaș to Horațiu Potra for €10,000, paid in cash. Heit and Bodi also appear in a photograph posted on Facebook alongside Potra.
By the seaside. Registered in 2019 by Ovidiu Cocoș, the company Josip&Bodi Gold Property purchased four apartments in Năvodari and two parking spaces that same year for €1.3 million.
In 2021, the company changed its name to Gold Property Concept SRL. In the period that followed, it sold the apartments for €5 million. They were purchased by two companies also founded by Ovidiu Cocoș. The transactions were later canceled.
Cocoș has also owned, directly or through companies registered in his name, apartments in Sibiu, Cluj, and Brașov.
Bodi owns a villa with a swimming pool in Tunari, registered in his own name.
Author: Maria Sharapova
