Part III: Grachev’s Flight of the Falcon
April 2, 2026
Editor’s Note: The post about Andrei Grachev’s Falcon Finance appeared briefly on Telegram Notes. The service we used for these essays blocked the content. Then we learned that LinkedIn had blocked a short post by me and a subsequent repost by a person who follows my writings. I don’t want to speculate. I will leave that to you. Here is the original post. There are two previous essays about Andrei Grachev, a former luminary on the RACIB board in Moscow, Russia. We will re-release the blocked Telegram content probably next week. Until then, try to figure out who would want the information in this write up removed from public access. Maybe it was the nifty image of the falcon fleeing from a burning financial vehicle? Maybe it was my rhetorical style? This essay comes from my collection of notes on on-going research related to my new monograph “The Telegram Labyrinth.” The time window for the events is May 2025 to December 2025. Most of the information originated in Russian social media; for example, online articles, Telegram messages, items in PCNews.ru, and VKontakte pages. Content disappears from services in Russia and many links to the sources my team and I accessed are now offline. This approach to revisionism works quite well. I collected my notes and continue to sort and resort them. Remember, the statements in this essay are from my notes and should be viewed as working hypotheses. Verify before you trust any of my observations. These are speculations I captured as I was writing “The Telegram Labyrinth” and as I draft my 2026 lectures to cyber investigators. Keep the disclaimers in mind as you review this briefing document. Also, the blocked essay appeared prior to the Iran War. When you read this essay, the falcon could be vaporized. — Stephen E Arnold, April 2, 2026
Two 2024 Events
Event one: Andrei Grachev changed the headquarters of DWF Labs from Singapore to the United Arab Emirates in December 2024. The wheeler-dealer in high frequency trading believed that the center of gravity for crypto had centered in a country known for Burj Khalifa (the world’s tallest building) and the royal families’ supercars.
Event two: Pavel Durov, the founder of Telegram and global crypto icon, deplaned at a Paris airport and immediately arrested by the French judiciary J3 cyber crime unit. At Telegram and the TON Foundation, senior professionals started to think about the future of the global service.
Only a handful of crypto professionals noticed Grachev’s administrative change. Pavel Durov’s arrest on basket of serious cyber crime charges. Durov was a global freedom and privacy superstar. Grachev was a financial engineer with a low profile.
In my notes, I wrote: “Durov believed that the Telegram and TON Foundation would need access to the US capital markets to make TONcoin the nuclear fuel of an alternative to the centralized financial systems. The French could derail Telegram’s revenue from illegal online services. Would he need market makers to pump up the value of the TONcoin.”
Luck, coincidence, or an informed decision may have allow Durov’s and Grachev’s organizations to work together.
Why Abu Dhabi?
Grachev had been operating in the blurred boundary of legal and illegal financial activity for almost a decade. The risks for certain crypto operators were increasing in the EU. The US financial markets required conformance to what he perceived as annoying rules and regulations about crypto transactions. But he sensed he had to pull off the same trick when he dodged jail for cargo theft. In 2015, he had squirted Clorox industrial-strength sanitizer by getting a degree from MESI (Moscow State University of Economics, Statistics, and Informatics), working at Huobi Moscow, and becoming a go-to crypto trading expert on the board of the powerful, Russian state-aligned RACIB. He had a feeling he might need to pull off a similar cleaning job if his HFT operation drew scrutiny.
His game plan was simple: Stay on the offense. Keep moving forward. He had prepared for his next move. True to form, while working at one big company, Grachev occupied his spare time orchestrating his next financial company. There is little evidence that he shared his extracurricular start up work with whoever was employing him. I wrote on one of my notecards: “Don’t hire Grachev. He spends time figuring out his next move, not doing the work he’s paid to do.”
To become a more fearsome financial force, Grachev had to find a country from which to operate. He had a small office in Dubai, but that city vibrated with Telegram’s rah rah and talk of Durov’s problem in France.
Grachev determined that the UAE was the right country and Abu Dhabi the best place to set up his new financial venture. The United Arab Emirates established the ADGM or the Abu Dhabi Global Market. ADGM operates an IFV or International Financial Center and an FFZ or financial free zone. I wrote on one of my notecards: “This is a state within a state with its own commercial laws. These appear to be based on English Common Law.” Grachev’s calculus resolved to “Operate from Abu Dhabi. Get certified as a ‘legitimate’ financial operation.”
ADGM introduced the world’s first DLT Foundations Regulations in late 2023, providing a legal structure for decentralized organizations and foundations like the TON Foundation to be registered as legal entities. Grachev had concluded sometime in 2024 that his long-time partners Marco and Remo Schweizers were baggage likely to be scrutinized by some mid-level financial bureaucrat. He dumped them and the Digital Wave brand.
He signaled to the crypto and financial world:
- Grachev to run his high frequency crypto trading business within the UAE’s Financial Services Regulatory Authority. The shift meant compliance, not an offshore black ocean operation. Grachev distanced himself from the perception of some that he was a shadow operator in providing crypto liquidity services. The ADGM umbrella delivered good optics to potential investors.
- ADGM is different from Dubai’s retail-focused crypto scene. The U-turn would allow him to handle more real world assets and broader financial services from the IFC.
- Abu Dhabi’s ADGM Foundations Regulations gave his new venture a “legal personhood. This status would, in theory, protect the entity’s assets if a regulatory issue became problematic.
How Grachev Infiltrated Telegram and Its Foundation
Grachev is bright and has a thirst for knowledge. What better way to understand the operation of Pavel Durov than to get involved with the TON Foundation. It was in Dubai. How does one gain access to its Board of Directors and people like Steve Yun, Manny Stotz, et al? Answer: Money.
In late 2022, Grachev had committed $10 million to the TON Foundation to fund developers’ TONcoin-centric projects. The “donation” made him a person of importance in the TON Foundation’s universe. He absorbed information about Telegram and the Foundation.
Did he learn that the TON Foundation was going to take dramatic steps to gain access to the US capital markets? Did a member of TON Foundation’s leadership say to him, “Andrei we are going need some market making action. Do you know anybody in this business?” Maybe Grachev was in the right place at the right time? Did Grachev’s falcon DNA let him see something that would put him in the right place at the right time? Who knows? Once again his luck or insight positioned him well.
Pavel Durov was going to trial on more than a dozen serious offenses. The TON Foundation churned through management personnel. Steve Yun, the president of the Foundation, left to run TON Ventures. That entity would invest in promising companies and own a stake in them. Manny Stotz took Yun’s job as president of the Foundation. Then a couple of months later left to run the first of the Telegram/TON Foundation’s US capital market start ups. The company was TON Strategy Company. Its business model was a knock off of Michael Saylor’s Strategy Company. Instead of amassing Bitcoin, Stotz’s firm would amass TONcoin.
A third play. was to buy the shell of a publicly-listed NASDAQ company and set up a firm that would accept investments to convert fiat currency and crypto to payoffs from an artificial intelligence data center play. Telegram would purchase AI compute from the AlphaTON Capital company, and in theory other customers would flock to AlphaTON Capital for lower-cost AI compute.
On my notecards related to the post-Durov arrest period, I jotted down: “Grachev was, in effect, a TON community insider. He had a market making track record. The falcon had the mouse.” By August 2025, Grachev created DWF MaaS, an outfit he registered in the British Virgin Islands. The HFT action would be handled by DWF Labs. (The MaaS meant “market making as a service. The service, of course, was the same type of HFT activity which added “vroom” to certain crypto transactions.)
By September 3, 2025, that Andrei Grachev, acting through DWF MaaS Limited, worked a deal that would allow him to manage a second firm with access to the US financial market. The arrangement was formalized through a Treasury Management Agreement with an effective date of August 29, 2025, and was explicitly detailed in September 2025 SEC filings for what is now known as AlphaTON Capital.
How would Grachev make money from this Telegram-centric deal?
The specific terms of his compensation, as detailed in SEC filings and the Treasury Management Agreement effective August 29, 2025, included:
- Revenue Share of Proceeds: Grachev’s entity was entitled to **75% of the proceeds** raised by the company that were managed by DWF, until a $55 million funding threshold was reached.
- Equity Compensation: DWF received 160,000 AlphaTON Capital shares. These would vest over 36 months.
- Trading Profit Retention: Under the agreement, DWF MaaS was permitted to retain trading profits generated from the assets it managed until the total balance reached the cap of $150 million. After passing this milestone, DWF MaaS would share 10 percent of its profits with AlphaTON.
To focus Grachev’s attention, Yuri Mitin and his colleagues allowed Grachev to subscribe to $15 million in AlphaTON shares, effectively becoming a principal funder of the firm’s pivot to a digital asset treasury model.
On paper, the deal is good for Grachev and DWF MaaS. For AlphaTON Capital, I jotted on a notecard: “Who advises AlphaTON Capital? Captain Kangaroo?”
Luck and planning worked. Grachev had a key to the US capital markets. Then the AlphaTON Capital’s engine room burst into flame.
The “falcon” flees a sinking ship. Art generated by Venice.ai.
Who Fired Whom?
After a couple of months on the job, Grachev figured that AlphaTON Capital was a loser. In December 2025, Grachev and AlphaTON Capital ended their relationship. On December 30, 2025, Grachev received some cash (a rumored $35,000 and allegedly $15 million in value). He was cut loose, terminated, RIFed, or fired. The other possibility is that Grachev wanted out and forced AlphaTON Capital’s hand. Either way, Grachev took off.
TONcoin value had dropped. Grachev couldn’t reverse that collapse when the global market for crypto was weakening. Then AlphaTON Capital stretched the truth with its Anduril Technologies announcement and burned its credibility with investors big and small. The shares (NASDAQ:ATON) slumped. AlphaTON Capital hired a new chief financial officer. The company retained a new law firm. The fire in the engine continued to burn. I jotted down on a notecard: “The unnamed international investors will not be happy.”
As of February 2026, no one has nailed down the specific events that unraveled. Had Grachev wasted his time with his involvement with Telegram-centric activities? Did he complain? Did he rage bait on social media? Did he appear on podcasts and grill Brittany Kaiser about the Anduril misstatement? Did he snipe at Mitin’s exposure to the “international” sources of capital? Nope. Nope. Nope. Nope.
Grachev did what Grachev does: He followed his game plan. Before the AlphaTON adventure, he had set up Falcon Finance in October 2024, seven weeks after Durov’s arrest in France. The official public launch of Falcon Finance took place on April 30, 2025, following a closed beta period. The purpose of this new British Virgin Island-registered company was to create a yield-bearing stablecoin named FF$. His standard operating procedure is to have parallel activities and options for whatever fate presents to him.
In September 2025 after signing the AlphaTON Capital deal, Grachev created the FF Foundation. The Foundation would manage $FF token unlocks, distributions, and ecosystem grants. On the day he left AlphaTON Capital, the disconnect from the Schweizers occurred. Grachev was in control of his HFT machine, his blockchain technology, and other oddments required to operate a crypto business within the white lines of the UAE’s regulatory rules.
Unlike DWF Labs or MaaS, which operated as opaque trading firms, Falcon Finance is a universal collateralization layer. It enables users to mint a synthetic dollar (USDf) using a wide variety of assets—including BTC, ETH, and tokenized real-world assets (RWAs)—and earn yield (USDf) generated through documented, on-chain funding rate arbitrage and cross-exchange strategies. It functions as an “on-chain hedge fund” where the yield is passed directly to the token holder rather than being retained as firm profit.
To what end? He had been surfing jurisdictions to avoid legal action. He had numerous business entities. He had a sweetheart deal with AlphaTON Capital?
“Grachevian logic” dictated that Grachev had to move up the crypto financial food chain: From stealing cargo to HFT, from HFT to crypto market making, from market making to running a hedge fund based on his own crypto coin. He simply popped up a layer in the financial engineering universe.
His FF Foundation was needed to hold the $FF crypto tokens and provide protocol governance. Just as Durov did after his legal problems with the US SEC, Grachev created a Foundation. If Falcon Finance was taken to court in the EU or the US, the Foundation structure would in theory protect to some degree the FF crypto assets.
Plus, he could demonstrate that he could not arbitrarily manipulate the token supply, an allegation leveled at Telegram. Grachev’s Foundation uses a preset schedule for token releases, which is “audited” by third parties such as ht.digital.
His Foundation is registered under the ADGM DLT Foundations Regulations. This allows the protocol to function as a “legal person” in the UAE, enabling it to sign contracts with real-world custodians like Fireblocks and Ceffu without being classified as a traditional “investment fund.”
The Falcon Hunts Plumper, Healthier Prey
As he wound down his AlphaTON Capital work, the Falcon Fund (formally the Falcon Finance Ecosystem Fund) and the associated protocols transitioned from a high-growth “startup” phase into an institutional liquidity layer.
Grachev’s has made a clear move toward real world assets, “traditional” collateral, and regulated payment gateways. Falcon Finance wants to cut clear, straight lines through the crypto ether. The flight path seems to be a way to deflect future SEC or international regulatory scrutiny.
Grachev had taken strategic and tactical steps to convert his luck or his vision into business opportunities when he was “working” on behalf of AlphaTON Capital. I wrote on my notecards: “Maybe Yuri Mitin kicked Grachev out because he did nothing but work on Falcon Financial?”
What did Grachev do prior to his termination and dumping of past tie ups in Switzerland? He took four specific steps:
- Copy Telegram. On January 31, 2026, Grachev launched a $50 Million Ecosystem Fund. The fund would provide money to developers building on top of the Falcon protocol. Grachev modeled this upon the TON Foundation investments in its developers. The pool of money pays developers who create smart contracts that use his USDf token. Allegedly half of the capital is deployed as direct investment (USDf/USDT), while the other half consists of vested $FF tokens to incentivize long-term builders.
- Do the “Blue Chip” Collateral Boogie. He launched of two value reserves or in the lingo of the crypto crowd “Vault” products. One is a Bitcoin Vault. Bitcoin can be deposited as collateral to mint Grachev’s USDf and paying (allegedly three to five percent annual percentage rate). The approach seems to push the USDf supply past $2 billion. The other is a reserve for Tether Gold (XAUt). Grachev’s customers can earn up to a four percent return on gold-back tokens. These can be used as collateral for hedging Falcon Financial investments.
- Follow Rules. After the alleged split from the Schweizers, Falcon Financial focuses on deals that comply with UAE rules. First, Falcon Fund integrated with the Altery payment system. This firm’s payment infrastructure is regulated by the UK’s Financial Conduct Authority. In effect, anyone with USDf tokens can use traditional banking systems to obtain fiat currency. Grachev, therefore, is working within anti-money laundering and know-your-customer rules. Without this institutional customers would shun Grachev’s Falcon Fund. Second, shortly before the split with AlphaTON Capital and the Schweizers, Grachev worked a deal to accept CETES or Mexico’s Certificados de la Tesorería de la Federación as collateral. This “play” may be one of the first use of Mexican debt as a security deposit to back on-chain loans or synthetic assets. Grachev’s Falcon Fund appears to move sovereign debt from an emerging market into decentralized finance (DeFi) system. Grachev’s action uses sovereign debt to back the synthetic dollar, positioning USDf as a competitor to traditional fiat-backed stablecoins like USDC.
- Do Magic. In early January 2026, the FF Foundation passed its first formal governance proposal called FIP-1. Control of the “system” consolidated power within a core group of committed holders. The idea is that people with skin in the game would direct the FF Foundation’s activities. Instead of Grachev running the show, people with committed capital would convert money for access to the $FF token. In exchange for “committed” money, these people would get a higher yield and voting power. Instead of the shadowy whales beneath the Telegram interface, the FF Foundation put the prey in a fish bowl.
What’s Next?
I want to mention a fact about the Eurasian kestrel or falcon. The bird has the ability to see ultra violet light. If you are a vole or a mouse, you typically mark your territory with urine. Most cannot “see” the trace. What does the falcon see? Answer: Bright territorial markings. The falcon uses this ultraviolet vision know where to wait for its next meal to appear.
Grachev may have a similar special gift. As he moved from stealing a shipment of goods to immersing himself in high-frequency crypto trades, he was able to profit from his current activities. He then monitored for indications of another opportunity. The lessons learned from his 2022 to 2025 linkage with Telegram-centric activities provided useful information. He took his payoff to go away, but he had spotted an even bigger opportunity to profit. His Falcon Finance operation was sitting in a garage in Abu Dhabi. Technicians had set up the system. Blockchain was working. Smart contracts were ready to deploy. Governance plans were locked and loaded.
When his departure from AlphaTON Capital occurred, Grachev climbed in his new, registered, squeaky clean Falcon Financial vehicle, and drove to the headquarters of his next big play.
Was he embarrassed by his termination at AlphaTON Capital? No. He had his next opportunity revved and ready. Was his distraught at cutting ties with his multi-year partners Marco and Remo Schweizer? No. He had something bigger and potentially more profitable to run. Had he become the elite financial professional with access to the rich and powerful? Not yet, but he was in a position to move up in the financial system.
A mistake in the game he is playing might hood the falcon. Instead of flying free, he could spend the rest of his life in a cage. This business quest is underway now.
Stephen E Arnold, March 9, 2026, Reposted on April 2, 2026
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