Don’s Truth Social; Leather Bibles with no leather, Gold sneakers with no gold, and boner pills that kill boners (and host)
HARD TO SWALLOW; Criminals of a feather keep flocking together
The Russian who loaned Donald Trump’s social media platform Truth Social $8 million previously set up websites selling dodgy sex pills, according to records seen by The Daily Beast.
The flagship product sold by these sites, Vimax—which promises longer sex and a firmer erection—has prompted warnings from health regulators in the U.S. for containing hidden ingredients that may endanger health. The Food and Drug Administration warned consumers not to buy the supposedly natural male enhancement supplements, and told anyone who had bought the tablets to throw them out.
The sites where the pills were sold included vimaxtrialoffer.com which was registered in the name of Anton Postolnikov, 40, according to public domain ownership records. The Gmail account used to set that up was also used for vimax-detox-trial.com and vimax-trials.com. For communications regarding the pills, a series of email addresses @vimaxgroup.com were also set up and registered in Postolnikov’s name.
The Russian entrepreneur, who reportedly has family links to the Kremlin, has a history of success in niche online businesses such as providing financial services to porn stars and camgirls.
Postolnikov—whose aunt is reportedly married to Aleksandr Smirnov, a former Russian deputy minister of justice and Kremlin insider—emigrated to the U.S. in 2018.
In 2021, he gave $30,000 to Florida Governor Ron DeSantis. In the same year, documents show that a company listing Postolnikov as its “authorized person” owned two dwellings on Miami’s private Fisher Island worth $13 million. The company that owns the luxury properties, 7812 Fisher Island LLC, is the subject of ongoing divorce proceedings in Florida where Postolnikov is splitting from Olga, a fellow native of St. Petersburg who describes herself as a photojournalist.
Postolnikov has also been suspected by U.S. federal agents of making nearly $23 million in 2021 from alleged insider trading on Trump’s social media platform, according to court documents filed by defense attorneys. The accusation was revealed in court documents related to three men, financier Michael Shvartsman, his brother Gerald, and Bruce Garelick, who were arrested last June and charged with insider trading. In February, the government also added money laundering charges. Both Michael and Gerald Shvartsman pleaded guilty to one count of securities fraud in early April.
Postolnikov has not been charged in the case, but court documents filed by the other defendants seeking to have the evidence discounted, reveal that he has been included in the FBI’s investigation. Postolnikov is alleged to have taken part in the insider trading scheme following “good times” spent in the company of two of the defendants ahead of official announcements by listed company DWAC, according to an FBI affidavit included in court files obtained by The Daily Beast.
“When you’re rich they let you”
Sex Pills
Before his alleged foray into Florida high finance, Postolnikov was involved in the selling of Vimax, which was sold via offshore companies in the U.S., Cyprus, and Mauritius, according to the products’ websites. New Century Beauty LLC, the company which was described as owner and operator of vimaxtrialoffer.com on the site, is registered at the California address of Postolnikov’s mother, Lyudmila Postolnikova, aged 73. Izef LLC which listed Postolnikov as an administrator, handled sales of Vimax for a period, according to archived snapshots of the sales websites.
The Vimax brand was trademarked by OA Internet Services, based in Canada, which was run by Andrei Octav Moise.
“My company did indeed curate the trademark as part of the affiliate program agreement regarding Vimax. The objective was to provide security that Mr. Anton Postolnikov pays affiliate commission owed to advertisers. This is common practice in management agreements of affiliate programs,” Moise told The Daily Beast.
Moise was also for several years director of Gestion Paxum Inc., a payments company, also known as Paxum Inc., which held a Canadian license. Postolnikov’s Paxum Bank, an institution based in the tiny Caribbean island nation of Dominica, has won multiple awards as a favorite financial institution among online sex workers.
“Mr. Postolnikov never had any direct or indirect relationship to Gestion Paxum Inc,” Moise said.
The Food and Drug Administration put out a warning about Vimax telling consumers to throw it away. The drug claimed to be a “100% natural product,” but the FDA said it contained tadalafil, an ingredient that could lower blood pressure to dangerously low levels if taken in combination with other commonly prescribed drugs. The agency advised “consumers not to purchase or use Vimax.”
Moise says the drugs examined by the FDA were counterfeit versions of their product. “The FDA did indeed find knockoffs of Vimax sold by a Chinese company without any authorization from nor relationship to the Vimax brand. Essentially the knockoff products did contain illegal substances and were investigated by the FDA who ultimately held that they were not authentic Vimax products and had nothing to do with Vimax per se,” he said, although he explained that he does not have any access to documents or records to confirm this claim.
There is no mention of Chinese knockoffs on the FDA website, where Vimax is listed in the “Health Fraud Product Database” among the “Tainted Sexual Enhancement and Energy Products.”
Banking
Paxum Bank is named in a batch of leaked files from the U.S. Financial Crimes Enforcement Network (FinCEN), the Treasury department responsible for combating international money laundering and financial crimes.
The files, which show companies that have been flagged with Suspicious Activity Reports (SARs) by financial institutions, were leaked to BuzzFeed News in 2019 and shared with the International Consortium of Investigative Journalists and subsequently hundreds of partner media organizations in 88 countries around the world.
Paxum’s inclusion in the database has not been reported until now.
The files say that Standard Chartered bank in New York raised a SAR on Paxum for activities between 2013 and 2014. The FinCEN report said: “Paxum has been the subject of two prior SAR filings.”
“A review of the payments from Paxum to [another company] reflect that payments were made on the same and consecutive days, in the amount of $99,950.00, and the remittance references indicated ‘payroll.’ It is unclear why payroll payments would occur with such frequency and in such amounts,” the document says.
FinCEN says Paxum is a “high risk business” because of its “history dealing with… counterparties related to adult entertainment.” The report also says it operates in “high risk jurisdictions” and uses “inconsistent addresses.”
“Paxum has listed addresses in Belize and Canada, but maintains a bank account in Romania,” FinCEN wrote.
Paxum has not been charged or found guilty of any financial malfeasance. There is no suggestion of wrongdoing nor are suspicious activity reports evidence of any wrongdoing.
Postolnikov denies any wrongdoing both in Russia and in relation to Trump and Paxum. He told local media in his bank’s native Dominica that he has no connections to either the Kremlin or to money laundering, and said his firms always follow the rules. He threatened legal action against media outlets such as The Guardian and others who wrote about these controversies.
Family Ties
Mysteriously, Moise was also listed as a registered business partner of Elena Smirnova, according to Rusprofile, a company data website. Smirnova is Postolnikov’s aunt and reportedly the wife of Putin’s old underling Smirnov.
The database says the company registered to him and Smirnova, LLC PB Technology, was created in 2005 and wound down in 2019.
And yet Moise denied knowingly entering this partnership when approached by The Daily Beast via Telegram.“You want to go after everybody that ever dealt with Anton,” he said. “We will let the authorities decide if you are blackmailing me.”
Moise later said he was not aware of LLC PB Technology: “I was not a business partner with Elena Smirnova. Her name is known to me as I recall that she was responsible for accounting for Mr. Anton Postolnikov regarding the payments to affiliates.”
Moise announced that he was leaving Paxum Inc., in May. He denied any wrongdoing. Smirnova could not be reached for comment.
Trump Media
Postolnikov has reportedly attracted U.S. prosecutors’ attention for the way he structured the loan to Trump’s Truth Social through Paxum and an obscure entity called “ES Family Trust.” No charges have been filed to date, and the investigation was still in preliminary stages, according to The Guardian, which first reported it.
Wire transfer documents show that Trump Media received $2 million from Paxum Bank and another $6 million from ES Family Trust. Documents obtained by the authors show that the trustee for ES Family Trust is Angel Pacheco, who reportedly listed himself as an employee of Paxum Bank on LinkedIn.
Pacheco has other connections to those involved in Trump Media. He served as a director of Foundation Card Services LLC, along with Shvartsman at least until 2023. Pacheco could not be reached for comment.
In January 2022, Trump Media had an agreement with a brokerage firm, which names “Anton Postolnikov and affiliated entities” as “Introduced Parties” who participated in the deal.
FBI affidavits in the Shvartsman case reveal that Postolnikov bought large quantities of DWAC in September and October of 2021. During the same time he was allegedly in contact with other Trump media insiders, according to an affidavit by an FBI special agent. The document alleges that between Oct. 21 and Oct. 28 of 2021, Postolnikov sold all his shares in DWAC for a $22.8 million profit.
