Andrei Grachev: roles, reported accusations and replies

analysisA 2018 profile on a business-directory website presents Andrei Viktorovich Grachev as the official representative of the Huobi exchange in Russia, vice-president of the Russian Association of Crypto Business and Blockchain (RACIB), managing partner of the hedge fund Crypsis and head of an educational programme at the Plekhanov Russian University of Economics. This self-presented biography describes work in transport companies from 2007 to 2014, rising from a forwarder accompanying cargo to commercial director of a company with over 200 staff, without naming the companies; ownership of a premium taxi service from 2014 to 2016; commodity futures trading from 2014; work at the retailer Ulmart from 2015 to 2017; the founding of Crypsis in 2017; the RACIB vice-presidency from May 2018; and the leadership of Huobi Russia from September 2018. An announcement by the Moscow Chamber of Commerce and Industry of 4 June 2018 lists him, as vice-president of RACIB and managing partner of Crypsis blockchain holding, among the speakers at the conference "Moscow for blockchain – blockchain for Moscow" on 13 June 2018. His self-description on the VRM website, archived in March 2021, lists him as co-founder of Black Ocean (2020), a dark pool and liquidity pool for professional traders, chief executive of Jiamix (2019), an OKEx cloud-based exchange, and co-founder of VRM (2018), a high-frequency trading company, after work as a sole crypto trader from 2016 to 2018 and an oil-futures trader from 2014 to 2016. ^{1 2 3}

analysisThe magazine reported that by 2017 Grachev was trading cryptocurrencies and had started a company called Crypsis Blockchain Holding, and that a pitch deck for it found on a Russian business website promised returns of 2,000 percent; the deck is not retained here. In May 2018, according to the magazine, he became vice-president of trading at RACIB, a nonprofit crypto industry group created by German Klimenko, then an adviser to President Putin, whose board included executives of state companies, and in September 2018 chief executive of Huobi Russia, which under him formed a partnership with the state-connected bank VEB, employer of Vladimir Demin, who also sat on RACIB's board. The magazine adds that Grachev founded VRM Trade with Demin and enlisted Ilya Rynenkov, who worked for the state-owned bank VTB. These roles of Demin and Rynenkov are the magazine's account; apart from Demin's co-founder role, also reported by the cryptocurrency news outlet, no other retained record documents them. ⁴

analysisAccording to the cryptocurrency news outlet, by September 2019 Grachev was no longer chief executive of Huobi Russia, although he said he worked there as a partner for another year, and he was replaced by Vladimir Demin; Grachev later told a cryptocurrency news outlet that he had sold Huobi Russia back to Huobi for a "substantial profit". Huobi Russia shut down in December 2020 and was replaced by an exchange called CDAX. On 15 September 2019, the cryptocurrency news outlet reported, Grachev launched Jiamix, a Moscow-based cloud exchange set up in partnership with OKEx, which shut down two years later. An OKX spokesperson told the cryptocurrency news outlet that Jiamix was a broker and was never part of OKX or a branch of it. These accounts are based on Grachev's interviews and on a press release cited by the cryptocurrency news outlet. ¹

analysisSIA VROOM (registration number 40203277712, Ganību dambis 26A, Rīga) was entered in the Latvian commercial register on 4 December 2020 with a paid-up share capital of EUR 1 and was not registered for VAT, according to Lursoft's reproduction of the register. Notices in the Latvian official gazette Latvijas Vēstnesis in March 2023 record that the company's activity was terminated by a decision of a state notary of the Register of Enterprises of 10 January 2023, entered on 13 March 2023, that Andrei Grachev, its board member with sole power of representation, was released from office, and that interested parties were invited to apply for the appointment of a liquidator. The company was liquidated on 26 June 2023. The notices also contain personal identity data, which is not reproduced here. ^{2 3 4}

analysisA cryptocurrency news outlet reported in April 2019 that Grachev, then head of Huobi Russia, had attended a Moscow meetup organised by OneLife about the DealShaker platform, where deals are made in OneCoin, a token regarded in several countries as a large financial pyramid. According to a cryptocurrency news outlet, in a video conference with OneLife representatives he said that negotiations on listing OneCoin on Huobi had been going on for almost a month and that he hoped to agree "exclusive" listing terms in the second quarter. Grachev told a cryptocurrency news outlet that he had not known of DealShaker's connection with OneCoin and that the exchange had received "neither applications nor documents" for a listing; according to a cryptocurrency news outlet and the cryptocurrency news outlet he did not comment on his statements in the video, which the cryptocurrency news outlet later described as no longer available. No listing of OneCoin on Huobi is reported in the retained records. A cryptocurrency news outlet also reported that on 10 April 2019 Evgeny Zapolsky, owner of the company DAS Index, said that Grachev had borrowed $10,000 from him the previous year and, after several postponed repayment dates, stopped responding, supporting the account with screenshots of Telegram messages. That is one party's public account; no claim or court decision about the debt is recorded in the retained material. ^{1 2}

analysisA cryptocurrency news outlet further reported that Grachev had been chief executive of the 2018 ICO project Export.Online, which sought to raise up to $200 million for an international blockchain trading platform for exporters, chose the British Virgin Islands for its token sale and stopped the ICO at the end of June 2018. A representative of the St Petersburg investment club "Kapital" told a cryptocurrency news outlet that club members had invested 10 million roubles ($157,000) in the project and that at a meeting in summer 2018 Grachev and a colleague promised to repay the money in full with 40% annual interest for September to December 2018, but that the investors never received it. According to the same representative, members also invested 8 million roubles ($126,000) in a trading offer from Grachev that promised annual returns of 120-400%, and 80% of the money was lost within three months; a cryptocurrency news outlet added that some investors were considering complaints to law enforcement. Grachev told a cryptocurrency news outlet that investors were happy when they earned money and that some of them, when the market fell, started looking for someone to blame and went to the media without concrete demands, which in his view distorted the information. These are the investors' accounts as told to a cryptocurrency news outlet; no complaint, proceeding, court decision or official finding on them is recorded in the retained material. ¹

analysisA magazine wrote in April 2025 that Grachev, managing partner of DWF Labs, had led the Moscow branch of Huobi, opened in partnership with VEB's digital centre, and that he stepped down "under a cloud of suspicion" around his alleged link to OneCoin and accusations of failing to repay debts totalling more than $150,000, having earlier been vice-president of RACIB. The article summarises the earlier a cryptocurrency news outlet and the cryptocurrency news outlet reporting and adds no new documents. ³

analysisThe magazine reported on 17 June 2025, citing a sentencing document, that in April 2015 "a Moscow criminal court" charged Grachev and an accomplice with fraud: they were accused of creating a fake logistics firm, recruiting unwitting drivers and using them to steal cargo, including a multimillion-rouble shipment of canned food. The pair admitted their guilt, and according to the magazine Grachev received a suspended three-year prison sentence with five years' probation and a fine of 450,000 roubles. The retained copy of the judgment it cites, of the Istra City Court of the Moscow Region in case no. 1-209/2015 (hearing of 7 May 2015, fraud under Article 159(4) of the Russian Criminal Code, special procedure on admission of guilt), imposes that sentence, three years' imprisonment suspended with five years' probation and a fine of 450,000 roubles, on a defendant identified only as "Grachev A.V.", with personal details redacted. The retained records therefore do not establish that this defendant is the DWF Labs managing partner. The magazine wrote that Grachev did not respond to its requests for comment sent through X and a professional-network website, and no statement by Grachev on this report was found in the retained records. ^{1 2}