The crash of Yevgeny Prigozhin, leader of the Russian mercenary organization Wagner Group, has spread throughout the crypto community. Given his previous feud with Russian President Vladimir Putin, US President Biden hinted that Putin may be the mastermind behind the plane crash, but there is no final investigation result yet. Foreign media pointed out that Prigozhin is likely to be the fifth largest whale holding 100,000 bitcoins. His death means that the funds will disappear, and his previous series of improper business practices through Bitcoin will be buried forever.
The British BBC reported that the identities of the victims have been preliminarily determined. Authorities have launched an investigation into the crash involving Prigozhin. Earlier, Biden hinted that Putin might be behind the plane crash. He said in an interview with CNN: "You may remember that someone asked me about this."
Biden was referring to comments he made in July when he said Prigozhin should be concerned for his safety after the failed coup. "I said I would be careful about what I ride on, and I don't know exactly what happened, but I'm not surprised."
Speaking in July, CIA Director William Burns predicted that Putin, whose carefully curated aura of power had been shattered by the uprising, would sooner or later exact revenge for Wagner's defection. "Putin is the ultimate believer in revenge," Burns said at the time. "If I were Prigozhin, I would not fire my food taster."
Despite the rumors, there is still no actual evidence that Putin ordered the "killing" of Prigozhin, so everything remains just market speculation.
After the news of the plane crash broke, BeInCrypto quoted discussions in the crypto community, saying that Prigozhin is likely to be a Bitcoin whale who controls a crypto wallet holding 100,000 bitcoins, worth about $2.6 billion at current prices.
Around 70% of the funds are believed to be held in cold wallets, with the remainder appearing to be spread across the Binance exchange BTC-W.
Based on the known crypto whales, the third largest Bitcoin wallet has 118,300 Bitcoins and the fifth largest wallet has 94,643 Bitcoins. Therefore, if Prigozhin does hold 100,000 Bitcoins, he will be among the top five Bitcoin holders.
Although there is no concrete evidence that Prigozhin is involved in cryptocurrency transactions or has such a large wallet, environmental factors hint at his potential interest in digital assets. The report mentioned that at the beginning of 2022, tensions between Russia and Ukraine intensified, and Russia was the first to be restricted by multiple Western bans.
As a result, major financial entities including Visa and Mastercard have withdrawn from Russia, limiting cross-border transactions. As a result, many Russians see cryptocurrency as a viable workaround.
In July 2023, the OSCE Parliamentary Assembly designated the Wagner Group as a terrorist entity, and even before this classification, the company's legal status sparked a debate that could jeopardize its financial operations.
Despite Wagner's alleged cash payments to mercenaries, the PMC moved operations to Russia and Belarus after its June 2023 defection, where physical currency transactions are still possible. However, given Wagner's influence in Africa, cryptocurrency, especially Bitcoin, could facilitate smoother remote financial transactions due to its prevalence in shadow markets.
Importantly, with the right security precautions, Bitcoin can facilitate anonymous transactions, making it the currency of choice on the dark web. The report found that there are actually multiple channels on the dark web that allow products to be purchased using Bitcoin.
Notably, the June 2023 uprising involving Wagner led to a surge in stablecoin purchases by Russians.