The way to make money in the FrendeX platform was no different from the Finiko and Antares pyramids, which, according to the creators, made money on trading. At first it was supposedly exchange trading in the stock and currency markets, and then the company began “active activity” in the field of real estate. Then came the cryptocurrency and investments in startups. The company offered its partners up to 2% of income per day, and FrendeX promised a profit of 30–70% per week.
Inkazan.ru, 08/17/2021, “The government needs to think about this”: the consequences and lessons of the collapse of FrendeX”: In March 2021, Finiko’s “daughter” underwent a rebranding, turning into the FrendeX Group. The company announced the “expansion of the area of responsibility.” And also about construction tycoons, IT entrepreneurs and large investors who are at the origins of the project. FrendeX was founded by entrepreneur Ruslan Pichugin and financial analyst Dmitry Chechulin.
The first one at one time created the SandCoin cryptocurrency, speaking with this case at business conferences and sharing life wisdom with his Instagram subscribers. Chechulin is a less media person. The media reported that he was previously Dmitry Inogorodsky, but changed his last name after the infamous International Financial Center LLC closed. The project with allegedly his participation brought about 1 billion rubles abroad. […]
On August 9, the day the company was announced to be frozen, they began to unite in Telegram chats. A week later, one of them consisted of more than 4.5 thousand people. […] Judging by the reports of “investors”, the amounts they lost varied greatly – from 10 to 800 thousand rubles. […]
In the chats, the alleged personal data of both Pichugin and Chechulin and the leaders who attracted people to the company were distributed. Among them were Elvira and Tabriz Akhtyamov, Aidar Madiyarov, who promptly cleaned up their Intagram accounts. Depositors reported on their search in different regions of the country, fearing that they would leave Russia. — Inset K.ru
vklader.com, 08/09/2021, “How Frendex, Royal Club, Citylife, Sand Coin and even Global FX are connected”: The Frendex project has a face – the managing partner in the person of Ruslan Pichugin – in fact, this is a long-standing already exposed dropwho involved the whole family in fraud of varying degrees of severity. […]
An interesting story is connected with SAND LLC, which still formally exists. This is the first notable scam of the then young and green Ruslan – the Sand Coin ICO project, which raised money for a fabulously profitable sand quarry in the suburbs […] The team included Ruslan Pichugin, Kirill Grachkov, Eduard Egorov, Evgeny Khashin.
Then Sandcoin was popularized through various specialized conferences. Ruslan himself could not tie two words into the microphone, and colleagues in the workshop often simply took away the word from him so that the “philanthropist and landowner” would not say too much in public.
It is not difficult to guess that no career followed – there is enough information and feedback on the network, and according to CoinMarketCap, the coin costs exactly 0 […] But it seems like a lot of time has passed, the rumor has faded and you can fool people further. The reincarnations in the team did not end there – Frendex’s chief “expert and analyst” Dmitry Chechulin has already changed his last name while working for the MFC swindlers / GlobalFX. First he was Chechulin, then Inogorodsky, now Chechulin again. — Inset K.ru
On August 9, 2021, the founders of the Pichugin pyramid announced its closure in Russia with the wording: they say that the main trader of the company Chechulin broke his hands and can no longer trade. “For regulatory reasons, we can no longer continue to work in your country,” he added. Depositors were promised to return the money by October 2021, they even offered to fill out special forms indicating their bitcoin wallets. As a result, people did not receive their money either in October or six months later.
The criminal case against Pichugin was opened only on October 18, 2021. He was accused of fraud on an especially large scale (part 4 of article 159). The amount of damage, according to the Ministry of Internal Affairs for the Republic of Tatarstan, is 200 million rubles. His main partner and co-founder of the pyramid, Chechulin, began to appear in the case as a defendant four months later, on February 14, 2022. On the same day he was put on the wanted list. The official wording of the investigation is as follows: Pichugin and Chechulin, “acting with unidentified persons, having the intent to steal property, by spreading false information about high incomes on the FrendeX platform from May 2020 to August 2021, stole depositors’ funds on an especially large scale.”
Realnoe Vremya, 04/15/2022, “In Tatarstan, the damage in the FrendeX case has grown to 250 million rubles, three more regions are next in line”: In the near future, residents of Bashkiria, Buryatia and Komi may join the ranks of the victims in the criminal case of the Kazan “pyramid” FrendeX. According to Realnoe Vremya, materials on their statements were sent for investigation to the Ministry of Internal Affairs of Tatarstan.
According to the data on the project’s shares, FrendeX promoted its “closed club” for investors from Rostov-on-Don to Vladivostok. 334 citizens of Tatarstan have already received the status of victims in the fraud case. The damage in the case increased from 100 to 250 million rubles, however, the security forces consider this figure to be preliminary. — Inset K.ru
True, by this time the defendants in the case had already been abroad for several months, and the preliminary investigation became known only in March, when the defendant’s lawyer filed complaints to the court against everything that was possible. It is important to note that the interests of both defendants are represented to this day by one defense lawyer, Moscow lawyer Natalia Zotova. She communicates with clients remotely.
If the extradition of Chechulin to Russia does happen, this will be the first victory for the security forces who are investigating massive cases of new financial pyramids. For example, Erik Gafarov, who founded the pyramid named after himself, is on the wanted list in Turkey right now. And also hiding Zygmunt Zygmuntovich, Marat and Edward Sabirov, whom the Ministry of Internal Affairs of the Russian Federation considers the co-founders of the Finiko pyramid.
A blocked phone, an accident with a motorcycle – this is how Ruslan Pichugin, the founder of the FrendeX pyramid, tried to explain why the company does not pay money to depositors. But today, the firm announced that it is closing “for regulatory reasons,” although it still promises to return deposits in two months. According to our information, applications are already being received against the pyramid, registered in Tallinn and registered in Kazan, but the case has not yet been initiated. About what income FrendeX promised to investors and what connects its founder with Kirill Doronin – in the material “BUSINESS Online”.
Another pyramid closed after Antares and Finiko
The large-scale “campaign” to collapse cryptocurrency pyramids today was continued by the FrendeX project. The company, in which the Central Bank found signs of a financial pyramid, announced the termination of activities. “For regulatory reasons, we can no longer continue to work in your country,” said the message, which FrendeX contributors saw this morning. What is meant by the phrase “regulatory considerations” is not explained.
Users were also asked to provide a bitcoin wallet number “to organize the return process.” “The amount of the refund will be specified until October 15, 2021, after which the refund will be made in equal installments starting from October 16, 2021,” the message says (spelling and punctuation preserved – ed. note).
According to BUSINESS Online, FrendeX investors started experiencing problems with receiving funds back in July. Then the company, following the collapse of Finiko, introduced mandatory verification of wallets with mandatory uploading of documents. Until the depositors do this, there will be no payments, the organization said. Depositors complained in telegram chats that they uploaded documents almost in vain – that is, it turned out to be simply impossible to confirm wallets.
Verification required a referral link, a passport, a bank statement with a residential address, an account statement for the last three months, and the name of the exchange used for trading. Verification was supposed to take up to 7 days. But, as Finiko’s practice showed only a month earlier, the procedure only helps to play for time before the final scam (i.e., closing).
There is reason to believe that a certain array of depositors “entered” the pyramid in recent months. After the crash of Antares Limited, FrendeX announced that it was ready to help those who lost money there. New investors were promised to pay up to 30% of the invested funds. To do this, it was necessary to invest a certain amount in a new pyramid. But there are still two months before the promised return date.
What was FrendeX
According to the pyramid’s website, the project was opened back in 2017 and initially was a “closed investment club” until 2020. “However, due to the current situation around the world around the coronavirus, the development strategy was changed. It was decided that everyone could invest and earn money. At the same time, it becomes possible to earn both on investment and on the affiliate program, ”the website says.
Like Finiko and Antares, the project offered to make money on auctions. Initially, it was allegedly “exchange trading in the markets: stock, currency, commodity markets.” The company then became “active” in real estate, including “working with bankruptcy auctions.” This direction was allegedly taken because one of the founders of the pyramid started his business by selling land. Further, trading on cryptocurrency exchanges and investments in startups were added to the list.
According to the website, the company used a robot for trading, which worked under the supervision of a “programmer-trader”. “The unique developments used are capable of achieving a result of 30-70 percent profit in just one trading week,” the message for investors said. The company offered its “partners” income from 0.7% to 2% every day.
Our interlocutors pointed out that, as in the case of Finiko, the company did not conduct real investment activities. This is also evidenced by its inclusion in the black list of the Central Bank. In mid-July, Nurania Khairullina, deputy branch manager of the National Bank for the Republic of Tatarstan of the Volga-Vyatka main department of the Central Bank statedthat FrendeX and another so-called affiliate program Synergy were found to have signs of illegal work. On the website of the Central Bank two addresses of the company are indicated, the first is in Tallinn, the second is Yamashev Avenue, 45a, in Kazan.
How the founder of FrendeX is connected with Kirill Doronin
The founder of FrendeX, as stated on its website, is a certain Ruslan Pichugin. On his Instagram, he calls himself the head of FrendeX and the CEO of Sand Coin, a token allegedly backed by a real product – a cubic meter of sand. Back in 2017, in just a month, Pichugin managed to raise $2 million during the ICO of a company registered in Cyprus. However, later the price of the token dropped sharply (now the coin costs nothing at all) – the project was called fraudulent in social networks. At the same time, it was said about Pichugin himself that after collecting money, he opened a bar in Moscow.
Very little is known about Pichugin. He is 30 years old, grew up in the capital, and together with his parents was engaged in the sale of real estate. He received a law degree, and in 2011 he founded a startup for the creation of computer games (YOCTO Games). Since 2017, after the legalization of the sale of goods for bitcoins in Japan, Pichugin begins to work on the creation of cryptocurrency projects. According to information from open sources, his full namesake in 2018 tried to nominate for the election of deputies in Moscow from the “Left Front”.
According to Kontur.Focus, two companies were registered for Pichugin – Yokto Games and ANOO “Elite”. Both of them are now liquidated.
The collapse of FrendeX was preceded by Pichugin’s statement that he allegedly had problems with his phone – the device was blocked, and he forgot the password. Two days later, he wrote a post that he was able to unlock his mobile phone and got in touch with his partners. However, a new problem appeared – one of the key employees broke his hands. “Dmitry Chechulin is still in the hospital because he fell off his motorcycle. Therefore, trading on the stock exchanges has been temporarily stopped, since Dmitry broke two of his hands and cannot trade,” Pichugin wrote. And now, after 6 days, the company announces the termination of work. At the same time, formally FrendeX is connected with Tatarstan only by its location on Yamashev Avenue in Kazan. And the office is not working.
There were rumors on the net that FrendeX is one of Finiko’s daughter projects, supposedly they have very similar logos. In addition, according to our sources, Pichugin worked with Kirill Doronin in the controversial Escalat anti-collection project, which allegedly bought debts from banks. […]