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A recent Wall Street Journal report revealed that German billionaire Christian Angermayer has been connecting Tether to various investment opportunities, including his portfolio companies Northern Data and Blackrock Neurotech.
Angermayer takes a fee from firms to introduce them to various investors. Additionally, he makes investments through a variety of entities underneath Apeiron Investment Group, his family office.
These entities include Elevat3, which partners with Peter Thiel’s Founder’s Fund, Presight Capital, Apeiron Partners, re.Mind, Cryptology (which he co-founded with Mike Novogratz), and Limestone Capital.
Overlaps with Tether
Angermayer owned a stake in Northern Data through Apeiron Investment Group. Northern Data has been accused by former executives of stock manipulation schemes.
He was reportedly paid a 5% fee for transactions that followed from introducing Tether to Northern Data.
Tether and Angermayer are also linked through Angermayer’s investment in Block.One, which was founded by the stablecoin’s co-founder Brock Pierce.
Block.One was also an investor in Northern Data.
Angermayer also invested in Bullish, the exchange spun out from Block One, via the Presight Capital investment fund. Additionally, Angermayer served as a ‘senior advisor’ to the firm, which has subsequently purchased CoinDesk.
He also invested in Blackrock Neurotech, a firm developing brain-computer interfaces via the re.Mind entity. Tether purchased a majority stake in this firm earlier this year.
Wirecard
Angermayer previously connected beleaguered Wirecard with SoftBank, eventually leading to SoftBank’s $1.1 billion investment into Wirecard.
Shortly after this investment, Wirecard collapsed due to accounting fraud.
Angermayer additionally helped coordinate HNA Group’s investment in Deutsche Bank, which saw his friend Alexander Schütz appointed to the supervisory board for Deutsche Bank.
Schütz was subsequently investigated for insider trading allegations in Wirecard, though the criminal probe was dismissed by prosecutors.
Tether itself has some distant ties to Wirecard. Freeh Sporkin & Sullivan, a consulting firm, once provided a letter that claimed Tether had the funds it was supposed to. Louis Freeh, a former FBI director, defended Allied Wallet, a payments firm that was a longtime client of Wirecard and provided services to questionable businesses, including Ponzi schemers, debt collectors, and online poker firms.
Additionally, FTX/Alameda Research, one of Tether’s top two largest clients, relied on Cuscal Bank in Australia, a former Wirecard partner.
Read more: Casino operators with ties to Tether, Wirecard busted for money laundering
Other investments
Angermayer, a former biotech entrepreneur, has a varied investment portfolio.
As well as a number of biotech and pharmaceutical investments, he has also invested in psychedelic therapies, something he chooses to partake in regularly. This is only part of his personal supplementation and pharmaceutical regimen, which also included Modafinil and Ozempic.
He also used to be a prominent investor in banks, purchasing the Banque Rwandaise de Développement, followed by a bunch of other banks across the region.
His investment portfolio also includes things like Boring Company, the tunnel company started by Elon Musk, which is part of the portfolio for Presight Capital.
He has also started paying “literal cowboys” to try to dig up dinosaur fossils in Montana, both because he loves dinosaurs and because he thinks it can be profitable.
Additionally, as previously mentioned, Elevat3 invests alongside Thiel’s Founder Fund regularly, including investing in the Enhanced Games, the international sports event that allows competitors to use any performance-enhancing drug they can get access to.
Angermayer’s role as a connector and networker sometimes stretches beyond simple business transactions; supposedly he is friends with Angela Merkel, the former German Chancellor.
Additionally, he reportedly introduced Thiel to Daniil Bisslinger, who works in Russia’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs. Bisslinger reportedly offered Thiel a meeting with Vladimir Putin, which Thiel reported to the FBI.
Angermayer told Forbes that this was an absurd controversy, stating, “I had a birthday party. I had two friends. They met each other there. Whatever friends of mine do, it’s not my thing.”