Jeffy Yu was days away from his 23rd birthday when he appeared to take his own life Sunday in a video. A flattering obituary appeared, calling the aspiring crypto mogul “a visionary artist, technologist, and cultural force” and “a tech prodigy from an early age.” A memecoin in Yu’s honor went up for sale.
But in the days that followed, online sleuths raised doubts about the video’s authenticity. The obituary disappeared. Whatever deceptive game was being played came to an indisputable end when The Standard found Yu on Wednesday, holed up at his parents’ Crocker-Amazon home.
Standing outside the two-story house, the supposedly gifted tech developer was agitated and shocked that he had been found after some routine internet searches.
“I’ve been doxxed. I’ve been harassed. If you can find me, other people can find me,” he said. “Now I have to move my parents out of here this week.”
Yu is the developer of Zerebro, an obscure cryptocurrency token with a market capitalization of $44 million. (Bitcoin, by comparison, has a market cap of $2 trillion.) Zerebro was little known until videos of Yu appearing to shoot himself began circulating early Sunday.
Some online spectators speculated the video came from a livestream on the pump.fun cryptocurrency platform, but a spokesperson for the company denied the event had taken place on its site, calling it “nothing more than a social narrative circulating on X” and “an edited fabrication” in a statement Friday.
That full video is no longer available, but snippets are circulating. His obituary, which called him a “Martyr of Imagination and Creativity,” is no longer on Legacy.com.
“His life, though brief, was lived with intensity, brilliance, and a devotion to creation that he hoped would inspire others for eternity,” the article said.
It’s unclear if the other details about Yu’s life can be trusted. The online memorial said he studied computer science at Stanford and attended Northeastern and Arizona State. He reportedly worked full-time as a software engineer in Santa Cruz. His LinkedIn profile says the same.
Dressed in a T-shirt, shorts, flip-flops, and wire-rimmed glasses, Yu declined to talk about the false report of his death or how he may have benefited financially from it.
“You can see the PTSD in my eyes, right?” he said before telling this reporter to leave.
Although the obituary touted his alleged successes, the more significant self-tribute was Sunday’s release of a memecoin that one of his social media accounts promoted in what claimed to be an automated message. “If you’re reading this, it’s because my 72 hour deadman’s switch triggered so i’m not here, at least physically,” the message said. The message described the new coin, dubbed $LLJEFFY, as “my final art piece” and “an eternal grave in cyberspace.”
Suspicions emerged quickly when cryptocurrency figures, including Wonderland CEO Daniele Sestagalli, claimed Yu had faked his death. Sestagalli published what he described as a private letter from Yu stating that the “suicide” was “my only viable exit from persistent harassment, blackmail and threats” and that he had to “definitively and permanently disengage.” Attempts to reach Sestagalli were unsuccessful.
On-chain analysis shared on social media by Bubblemaps, a crypto analytics platform, showed accounts linked to Yu moving up to $1.4 million in cryptocurrency after his supposed death. Several accounts accused Yu of orchestrating an elaborate “pseudocide exit strategy” to cash out his holdings.
Before his staged death, Yu published a manifesto introducing the concept of “legacoins” — described as an “evolution of digital assets commonly referred to as memecoins” that function as “a vault or storage, securing and preserving value indefinitely.”
New, confusing messages about Yu continue to arise. Early Thursday, the X account @eiuge74698713 announced that it would hold “a unique blockchain funeral event” for Yu.
“A true believer and builder of blockchain, someone who upheld his life’s belief even in death,” the account said. “He deserves to be honored in a uniquely blockchain way.”
If you or someone you know may be struggling with suicidal thoughts, call or text “988,” day or night, to reach the Suicide and Crisis Lifeline, or chat online.