Shadowy Telegram, the cloud-based instant messaging service that provides end-to-end encrypted voice and video calls and “secret” chats, has reportedly raised almost $1Billion in bond sales recently.
The company, with a reputation for hosting nefarious characters, including some who participated in the storming of the US Capitol, was founded by two brothers in Russia who had sold their prior messaging software platform to a Russian government controlled entity in what may have been a squeeze on the owners.
Since then, the duo and their programmers, after refusing to give the encryption keys to the Russian government, have gone from country to country, trying to find a safe haven from which to promote this service.
After a fight with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission about an initial coin offering, the company, now apparently headquartered in Dubai with a reported 500 million users, has sold “pre-IPO” bonds to the likes of Mubadala Investment Co and Abu Dhabi Catalyst Partners, which is part-owned by the Abu Dhabi state fund.
It’s reported that the state-controlled Russian Direct Investment Fund had subsequently purchased about $75 million of the bonds on the secondary market.
Any SPACs listening?
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