Thread by @AlbertYZhang

🚨 A thread on Adnow LLP and its subsidiary, FAZZE, an advertising agency linked to 🇷🇺 offering 🇫🇷 and 🇩🇪 influencers money to undermine the Pfizer Covid-19 vaccine with negative fake stories 👇

This is not a comprehensive investigation but identifies some leads:
1. Adnow LLP was likely a shell company set up by a
🇷🇺 company registration service
2. A registered address of Adnow is linked to money launderers and BTC-e - a cryptocurrency platform used by 🇷🇺 intel agencies

Here's a summary of what has been reported so far: theguardian.com/media/2021/may…

https://twitter.com/charliehtweets/status/1396860850699395074?s=20

French investigative website @Fact_N_Furious first identified a Russian job posting showing that FAZZE is a subsidiary of Adnow LLP, whose employees operate out of Moscow 🇷🇺 despite Adnow listing its HQ in London factandfurious.com/international/…
linkedin.com/company/adnow-…

FAZZE is not a registered company with UK's Companies House but Adnow LLP is …te.company-information.service.gov.uk/company/OC3907…

Adnow LLP and FAZZE both list 'Las Suite, 5 Percy Street, Fitzrovia, London, W1T 1DG' as their company's address (this address is important and we will come back to it later) web.archive.org/web/2020080311…
archive.vn/fCzGW#selectio…

According to UK Companies House filing records, Adnow LLP was incorporated in 2014 by Ewan Henry Tolladay and a Russian, Stanislav Fesenko, who is currently residing in Hungary but whose original service address was 11 Grina Street, KV.26, Moscow …te.company-information.service.gov.uk/company/OC3907…

Stanislav Fesenko has been an officer in multiple companies including UK-registered Enchanted Business Solutions LP and Echidna LLC in the US
brokersnavigator.com/companies/prof…
opencorporates.com/companies/us_w…

According to his Linkedin profile, Fesenko studied law, taxes and economics at the “[sic]Russain Tax Academy of Department of treasury” and is the CEO of Echidna LLC linkedin.com/in/stanislav-f…

Fesenko is also the registrant name of vnzh-hungary.com, a website providing residence permits in Hungary for Russian citizens and is run by 'ONG Consulting' whois.domaintools.com/vnzh-hungary.c…

The homepage of ong-consult.com shows that the company appears to provide registration of companies in Russia and abroad, opening foreign bank accounts and legal support of commercial activities.

Returning back to the address 'Las Suite, 5 Percy Street, Fitzrovia, London, W1T 1DG'. In total, 177 companies were/are registered at this address: companieshousedata.co.uk/a/784 (see street view below)

Coincidentally, Always Efficient LLP the company that allegedly operated the cryptocurrency platform BTC-e was originally registered at this address... …te.company-information.service.gov.uk/company/OC3941…

... and two of Always Efficient LLP's officers, Sandra Gina Esparon and Evaline Sophie Joubert, were co-officers of Dameer Global LLP (which also has the Percy St address registration) with Damitra Group LTD that ran Enchanted Business Solutions LP before Fesenko was registered

Sandra Gina Esparon and Evaline Sophie Joubert are also allegedly citizens of Seychelles that have been named in money laundering schemes bellingcat.com/wp-content/upl…

There are strong ties between BTC-e and 🇷🇺 intel. Crypto-analysis company, Elliptic, traced bitcoin wallets used by the Russian GRU hacking group 'Fancy Bear' during the 2016 US election interference campaign to BTC-e. elliptic.co/blog/doj-indic…

BTC-e's domain was later seized by the US and one of its founders, Alexander Vinnik, was arrested in Greece. The other founder, Aleksandr Bilyuchenko, still had back-up servers and relaunched BTC-e under the name of 'Wex' bbc.com/news/world-eur…

In 2018, Bilyuchenko testified that a man named 'Anton' asked him to turn over Wex assets and that the cryptocurrency would "go to the accounts of the FSB of Russia." Bilyuchenko said he was held in jail until he transferred $450 mil in crypto rferl.org/a/how-much-did…

The exact relationship between Adnow LLP/FAZZE, Always Efficient LLP, BTC-e and 🇷🇺 intel is ultimately unclear. The arrested BTC-e's founder, Alexander Vinnik, denies having any connection with Always Efficient LLP... bbc.com/news/technolog…

... but Always Efficient LLP was mentioned in BTC-e's Terms & Conditions web.archive.org/web/2017072209…

More reporting by @kromark @pustota @CarlSchreck and @Mike_Eckel from RFE/RL. Until 2018, the owner of the Russian unit of AdNow was Yulia Serebryanskaya - who has campaigned for the United Russia party and heads the organisation called Russian Initiative

https://twitter.com/kromark/status/1397931090002681858

Link to the English version of the investigation here rferl.org/a/russia-pfize…