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| OnlyFans Who is the enigmatic head of a porn empire, Leonid Radvinsky |
Profits at OnlyFans have increased dramatically over the previous year, and the revelation that its owner received more than $300 million (£238 million) in dividends has raised new concerns about the pornographic tycoon.
Entrepreneur Leonid Radvinsky, 41, is a Ukrainian-American with a $2.1 billion estimated net worth.
Guy and Tim Stokely, a father and son combination who established the business with a £10,000 ($12,500) investment two years prior, sold it to him in 2018.
Millions of pounds are reportedly what he spent for it. But who is he, and where did he get his money?
What information do we have on him?
To put it plainly, not much. Mr. Radvinsky chooses to keep his personal life private despite the premise of the platform he controls. He hasn't conducted a lot of interviews.
There are hints about his life on a LinkedIn page and a personal website, despite his apparent dislike to publicity.
A venture capitalist, philanthropist, and technology entrepreneur, Mr. Radvinsky is described as having "a special interest in emerging social media platforms" on his LinkedIn page.
On his personal website, Mr. Radvinsky claims to have spent the last 20 years "building software companies and contributing to the open source movement".
Born in the Ukrainian port city of Odesa, Mr. Radvinsky's company donated utilizing cryptocurrencies to the relief effort in Ukraine. According to CoinDesk, the donation's real-terms value in 2022 was more than $1.3 million.
According to Mr. Radvinsky, he contributes "a huge amount of time, effort, and money to non-profit causes," such as charitable organizations and technological endeavors.
He "is an avid reader who's always ready for a chess match and is an aspiring helicopter pilot," according to his website, in addition to programming and philanthropy.
Where is he a resident?
When he was a little boy, his family relocated to the United States, where they eventually settled in Chicago, according to the Daily Telegraph. Although we are unsure of the specific location, he now calls "sunny Florida" home.
Forbes claims that the billionaire is married, but the BBC has been unable to confirm who his spouse is.
Business background
OnlyFans is not Mr. Radvinsky's first company with a pornographic connection.
At Northwestern University, which is close to Chicago, Illinois, Mr. Radvinsky studied economics and received his degree in 2002. The businessman has since started a number of ventures.
He developed a website referral company named Cybertania prior to being the sole stakeholder of OnlyFans' parent company, Fenix.
Beginning in the late 1990s, the company provided customers with links to passwords for content, including pornography, according to Forbes.
He ran a prosperous adult webcam business prior to entering the market to purchase OnlyFans.
An interview request from the BBC received no response from Mr. Radvinsky.
Who or what organization is behind OnlyFans?
Despite Mr. Radvinsky's location in the US, the company that owns OnlyFans, Fenix, is still registered in the UK.
However, according to Companies House documents, Lee Taylor, the company's chief financial officer, is situated in the UK.
According to available records, creator and investor Guy Stokely left OnlyFans' parent company, Fenix, in December 2021.
Guy Stokely's son Tim resigned from his position as OnlyFans' CEO the same month in order to "pursue new endeavors."
OnlyFans has prospered while being owned by Mr. Radvinsky. Some of its most prominent authors now exclusively share content that is appropriate for work, and it is no longer just linked to pornography.
How much money is made by OnlyFans?
Pre-tax profits during the time period increased to $525 million, from $432 million the previous year, according to the London-registered company in August 2023.
On OnlyFans, the number of creators has increased by 47% in the last year alone to almost 3.2 million, while the number of users has increased by 27% to approximately 239 million.
Regulators and governments, however, have also criticized the platform and are now paying it more attention.
According to a 2021 BBC News investigation, OnlyFans was unable to stop minors from purchasing and participating in pornographic movies.
At the time, OnlyFans claimed that their age verification procedures went above and beyond legal requirements.
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