It’s tough for everybody at the moment. It’s harder to get a home loan, increase your credit limit, or to hijack a supertanker. That’s the word from Somali pirate Mohamed Abdi Hassan — also known as “Afweyne,” or “Big Mouth” – who is quitting the game.

Pirating has come a long way; a modern pirate needs weapons, a ship, a crew, and a publicist. At a recent press conference Big Mouth said:

After being in piracy for eight years, I have decided to renounce and quit, and from today on I will not be involved in this gang activity.

He is big in the pirate world, and the face of 21st century piracy. In 2011  The New York Times described Hassan as a sophisticated, resourceful character who raised venture capital for his pirate operations “as if he were launching a Wall Street I.P.O.” Last year, AFP reports, “he was described as ‘one of the most notorious and influential leaders’ in Somalia’s pirate-hub region of Hobyo, in a report by the UN Monitoring Group on Somalia and Eritrea.”

Hassan’s trophy cabinet back at Pirate HQ is not looking to shabby either, and perhaps he is just quitting while he’s ahead. Wired reminds us of his his successful 2008 capture of “the Sirius Star, loaded with $100 million worth of oil and about the size of a U.S. Navy aircraft carrier. Hassan got $3 million for the Sirius Star — he had initially demanded $25 million — and the notoriety of hijacking the biggest vessel in history.”

Obviously aiming for the Pirate Hall of Fame, Hassan boarded and took control of the Ukrainian ship the MV Faina later that year. It was, Wired reports, “packed with weapons: anti-aircraft guns, rocket-propelled grenades and at least 30 T-72 tanks.” Hassan wasn’t in it for the weaponry, just the cash, “and after over 100 days of maritime drama, helicopters hovering over the Faina dropped him over $3 million.”

According to the AFP, Hassan did not provide a reason for handing in his hook and peg-leg, although it probably has to do with piracy attacks off the coast of Somalia having “plummeted to a three-year low thanks to beefed up naval patrols.” He has, however, been trying to persuading other pirates to do the same.

I have also been encouraging many of my colleagues to renounce piracy too, and they have done it.