$500K in Bitcoin sent from France to US far-right groups

A French computer programmer transferred more than $500,000 in Bitcoin to far-right activists just before his death last month, including some involved in last week’s U.S. Capitol riot, officials said Friday.

The 35-year-old Frenchman scheduled an alleged suicide note to post on his personal blog the next day and his December 8 death was confirmed by one of his relatives to French site <a style="font-weight: bold;" class="class" rel="nofollow noreferrer noopener" target="_blank" website Minutes.     

The suicide note revealed he was chronically ill and wanted to leave his wealth to ‘certain causes and people’ as he lamented ‘unprecedented civil liberties violations’ stemming for the COVID-19 pandemic and Black Lives Matter protests. 

<a style="font-weight: bold;" class="class" rel="nofollow noreferrer noopener" target="_blank" website a firm that investigates Bitcoin transactions, found that the majority of the 22 transactions to 18 wallets on December 8 went to Nick Fuentes, a far-right internet influencer. 

Fuentes was in the crowd in Washington D.C. but has denied being part of the deadly mob that stormed the Capitol.

DailyMail.com linked the Bitcoin wallet with the username ‘pankkake’ identified in the Chainalysis report to an email address that is tied to the personal blog of French computer programmer Laurent Bachelier, pictured above in a YouTube video in 2017

Chainalysis, a firm that investigates Bitcoin transactions, found that the majority of the 22 transactions on December 8 went to Nick Fuentes, a far-right internet influencer. He is pictured above at the Stop the Steal rally on January but says he was not part of the riot

Chainalysis, a firm that investigates Bitcoin transactions found the recipients included anti-immigration organization VDARE, white nationalist leader Patrick Casey, the Daily Stormer blog, alt-right streamer Ethan Ralph, and a number of unidentified addresses

Chainalysis, a New York-based startup, specializing in countering money laundering and fraud in the digital currency space, launched the investigation after Yahoo News said they provided the company with the data points about the transaction.  

‘We have also gathered evidence that strongly suggests the donor was a now-deceased computer programmer based in France,’ Chainalysis said <a style="font-weight: bold;" class="class" rel="nofollow noreferrer noopener" target="_blank" website the report.  

The transaction was made by the alleged French donor by being sent to an intermediary wallet that has been active since 2013, ‘suggesting that the extremist donor is a relatively early adopter of Bitcoin whose holdings have grown in value significantly’. 

Chainalysis used open-source intelligence to find a bitcoin address linked this intermediatry wallet registered on NameID, with the pseudonym ‘pankkake’ as the username.

This username was linked to an  email address that is tied to the personal blog of the French computer programmer. 

The last post on the blog is a text entitled ‘End Note’ containing the same suicide note referenced in the Chainalysis report. 

Chainalysis did not release the man’s identity but the website and suicide note were tracked down and can be identified by DailyMail.com as belonging to a man named Laurent Bachelier. 

An Associated Press journalist also reported to have found his blog and suicide note. 

A funeral home published his obituary, including burial information, but later deleted it; a cached version can still be found on the internet, the Associated Press added.

And on Friday, a relative confirmed to 20 Minutes that he had died by suicide on the day the transactions were made and that they consider the suicide note authentic.  

By retracing the researchers’ steps, DailyMail.com linked the Bitcoin wallet with the username ‘pankkake’ identified in the Chainalysis report to an email address that is tied to the personal blog of French computer programmer Laurent Bachelier. It contained this suicide note

Chainalysis were able to trace the transactions through this Bitcoin wallet 

Federal investigators in the United States are now looking into possible ‘coordination or planning’ ahead of the riot. 

They added that they are using a number of methods they deploy routinely in criminal investigations, including examining financial transactions and cellphone and travel records.

Michael Sherwin, the U.S. attorney in Washington, said investigators were also examining whether there was any ‘command and control,’ and he vowed to bring charges if prosecutors can prove a conspiracy. 

No conspiracy charges have been brought so far.

French financial investigators declined to comment. 

In his suicide note, the computer programmer talked about the ‘decline’ of Western civilization and lamented ‘rejection of our ancestors and our heritage’, it added. 

It was posted to his personal blog that had remained inactive since 2014 until a new post was published on December 9, 2020 — the day after the donations were made. 

In the post, the Frenchman appears to claim that George Floyd died of a drug overdose, not because a police officer was kneeling on his neck and preventing him from breathing during his arrest. 

‘While it’s a long-term trend, this year in particular has shown how submissive the population can be,’ he stated, ‘first when accepting unprecedented civil liberties violations on the pretense of a virus less dangerous than seasonal flu, than kneeling down for a career criminal who happened to die of an overdose while resisting arrest, of pretend to fight for freedom of speech while jailing people for their ideas. 

‘Oddly, as trust in media is at historic lows, the population has blindly accepted those reality distortions. To top it all, F9 has been pushed back to 2021,’ he added referencing the delay in the release of the ninth installment of the Fast and the Furious movie franchise.   

Fuentes has hit back at claims he stormed the U.S. Captiol with other rioters

The transaction was made by the alleged French donor by being sent to an intermediary wallet that has been active since 2013, as pictured in the Chainalysis graph above

It was then sent on to 22 other wallets, most of which have not been identified

The Chainalysis  investigation found that the Frenchman sent 28.15 Bitcoins, worth about $522,000 to 22 addresses, including many belonging to American far-right activists and organizations. 

Fuentes, who was permanently suspended from YouTube last year for hate speech, received 13.5 bitcoins, worth about $250,000 at the time of the transfer, making him by far the biggest beneficiary of the donation, according to the blog post. 

‘The December 8 donation of over $250,000 worth of Bitcoin is by far the largest cryptocurrency donation Fuentes has ever received,’ the report noted. 

‘Previously, the most he had ever received in a single month was $2,707 worth of Bitcoin.’

Other recipients included anti-immigration organization VDARE, white nationalist leader Patrick Casey, the Daily Stormer blog, alt-right streamer Ethan Ralph, and a number of unidentified addresses. 

‘The donation, as well as reports of the planning that went into the Capitol raid on alt-right communication channels, also suggests that domestic extremist groups may be better organized and funded than previously thought,’ the researchers wrote.

It added that it was ‘the single biggest month we’ve ever observed in terms of cryptocurrency received by addresses associated with domestic extremism’. 

Chainalysis said it was ‘the single biggest month we’ve ever observed in terms of cryptocurrency received by addresses associated with domestic extremism’, pictured

Other recipients included anti-immigration organization VDARE

Daily Stormer blog was among the other recipients, pictured above

According to <a style="font-weight: bold;" target="_blank" class="class" rel="nofollow" website News, which first reported the discovery any motivation that the transfer was carried out to support the Capitol riot will be hard to prove. 

Chainalysis declined to directly link the transaction to the violence but wrote the ‘timing warrants suspicion’. 

It was made just less than a month before Trump urged his supporters on January 6 to ‘walk down Pennsylvania Avenue’ and ‘take back our country’, leading them to launch the deadly riot that resulted in the death of five people. 

A source told Yahoo News that federal investigators are now hoping to prevent any further attacks with their probe into this transaction. 

They are also hoping to uncover any potential foreign involvement in or support of right-wing activities and cut it off. 

Cryptocurrencies such as Bitcoin are favored for illicit transactions because they are perceived as hard to trace. 

The cryptocurrency is created using a software that develops an address and private key known only to the user. Even when the software is allowing transactions, it does not itself view the password.

It made Bitcoin popular among criminals and in countries such as China and Venezuela, where governments have raided bank accounts established by more traditional means.

And it also became highly popular among extremist groups after its anonymous 2009 release as open-source software. 

The cryptocurrency’s value has spiked in recent weeks but gained more mainstreamed popularity in 2017 after alt-right figure Richard Spencer tweeted, ‘Bitcoin is the currency of the alt right’.

Smoke from pepper-spray ball exploded and used against pro-Trump protesters during storm of Capital building. It is not known if the transactions are linked to the riot

Trump supporters gather as supporters storm the Capitol Building, pictured

That same year The Washington Post carried an investigation that explored how alt-right groups moved toward bitcoin following the deadly ‘Unite the Right’ rally in Charlottesville, Virginia. 

It has led to some prominent right-wing groups or sites displaying their bitcoin wallets as a means of receiving donations. 

Yet by displaying their wallets in this way, it also means that its transactions can be traced, making it easier for the likes of Chainalysis to track back its donations. 

‘With the right tools you can follow the money,’ Maddie Kennedy, Chainalysis’s communications director, told Yahoo News. ‘Cryptocurrency was designed to be transparent.’ 

Chainalysis warned in its report Thursday that it may become even more popular, therefore making these transactions between these groups harder to track, as they are kicked off other platforms.  

‘As mainstream payment platforms remove extremist groups and figures, we may see them embrace cryptocurrency more as a donations mechanism,’ the company said.

‘Luckily, thanks to the inherent transparency of cryptocurrency blockchains, law enforcement can track these transactions in real time and work with cryptocurrency businesses to prevent funds from reaching violent groups who may use them to fund their operations and commit acts of violence,’ it added. 

‘Chainalysis is actively looking to identify any additional extremist payments and activity and will keep our customers updated.’