The Spanish David Merino Quintana was arrested in Dubai this Monday, June 1. The arrest puts an end to years of escape in the United Arab Emirates, a country where the judge hearing the case had located his whereabouts.
His arrest represents the biggest advance to date in an investigation that has been accumulating victims, court files and headlines on several continents linked to the FX Winning scheme for years.
The reports from the Central Operational Unit (UCO) of the Civil Guard locate the alleged fraud of over 460 million euros and they point to an international structure that would have operated in around 30 countries.
The first estimates spoke of about 5,000 affected, although associations of injured parties and different sources linked to the procedure raised the figure to 15,000 investors around the world.
The investigation maintains that the organization would have raised capital through the promise of extraordinary returns linked to the forex market and cryptocurrencies.
According to the police hypothesis, the payments made to the first investors would have been financed with contributions from new participants, an operation compatible with pyramid or Ponzi-type schemes.
The internal controversy, Merino points to others
The case has a particularly striking public aspect. In March 2026, Merino reappeared in a video in which he denied having stayed with nobody’s money and pointed the responsibility towards other figures around him, especially towards José Lucas Cruz.
This reappearance fueled the debate among those affected and in the media, divided between those who consider him solely responsible and those who are waiting for justice to elucidate the distribution of blame within the organization.
The Civil Guard describes it in its reports as the main ideologue of the criminal organizationwho would have assumed management functions “in almost all cases, from the shadows”, after having officially left the company in 2021. To dilute his presence, “diverse and complex” national and international corporate structures would have been used.
In addition to the Spanish case, FX Winning would be being investigated in the United States — where the DEA points to a fraud of one hundred billion dollars — and in Mexico. In July of last year, four people linked to Merino They were arrested in Spain within the framework of the so-called ‘operation Borrelli’.
Detention does not imply automatic surrender. The procedure now depends on the Emirati courts and the formal documentation sent by Spain. The Spanish State You usually have between 15 and 40 days to prepare the file complete; If you do not send it within the deadline, the defense could request the release due to expiration of the provisional request.
It is important to mention at this point that the National Securities Market Commission of Spain, the CNMV, warned from 2021 that FX Winning was not “authorized to provide investment services.”
The FX Winning case is a reminder of the patterns that often precede this type of fraud. Promises of returns well above the market, opaque corporate structures spread across several countries, figures who direct from the shadows and the difficulty in recovering the money once deposited are warning signs that experts have been listing for years.
Identifying them in time continues to be the best protection against a sector that, despite its increasing regulation, continues to be fertile ground for deception. At CriptoNoticias we have prepared and disseminated articles that list what steps should be followed to minimize the risk of falling prey to deception or false investment promises.