Multi-billion crypto pyramid scheme Danvel Group: how scammers Mykhailo Romanenko and Nazar Babenko trick Europeans through Eternity.inc
A gang of cybercriminals, undetected by the justice system, is not slowing down.
Analysts are sounding the alarm: since the start of the full-scale invasion by the aggressor country, the level of fraud in Ukraine has been growing at an unprecedented rate . Last year was a record-breaking one, with a whopping 82,609 cases opened under Article 190 of the Criminal Code. As Ivan Chip writes in a review for the CRiME and [high-profile cases] projects , not all victims of fraudsters file reports with the police, so the actual scale of fraud may be several times greater. Meanwhile, in 2022, damages from online fraud and social engineering increased by 96% compared to the previous year, reaching UAH 1 billion. Last year, in 2023, they could have reached UAH 2-3 billion.
Last summer, in our investigative article "Crypto Pyramids in the Shadow of the Presidential Office," we detailed an organization codenamed Danvel Group , consisting of two scam companies – Danvel Ltd and Eternity Business . To give the "projects" legitimacy, they were registered as limited liability companies under British jurisdiction. The companies operated websites of the same name, purportedly offering a "unique investment product" containing a "formula for financial success." But in reality, these were financial "pyramids," where the percentage of return depended on the size of the "investor’s" contribution and the number of new clients they brought in.
According to publicly available information, the scheme is led by an inconspicuous businessman from Chernivtsi, Mikhail Romanenko (pictured above), along with two of his partners from Dnipro, Nazar Babenko and Igor Kotov .
Nazar Babenko and Igor Kotov
In 2022 and 2023, Danvel Ltd and Eternity Business were actively promoted not only in the Ukrainian and Russian-language segments of the internet, but also in English. Moreover, the information campaign emphasized the obscenely luxurious lifestyle of the defendants (Romanenko, Babenko, and Kotov), strongly hinting to the audience that they could earn large sums of money without much effort. For example, image-building publications claimed that Mikhail Romanenko had amassed a $1.5 billion fortune in cryptocurrency (which, of course, was never confirmed) and had amassed an impressive collection of supercars worth $10 million (which was also patently false).
At the time of our investigation’s publication last year, industry monitoring resources already considered the Danvel and Eternity Business projects "suspicious" and "potentially dangerous." Following the revelation, the scammers began to reformat their "business."
Last September, the domain name eternity.inc was registered , and it is now redirected from the eternity.business website, where the pyramid scheme of the same name was originally built.
There is also a redirect there from a dozen other sites dedicated to easy money making on the Internet.
The eternity.inc homepage claims to be a community with free membership. "By joining our global community, you’ll gain access to real estate, financial solutions, financial tools, a financial literacy academy, and much more," it says.
The hapless visitor is promised mountains of gold, but vaguely, without specifics. What exactly will their money be invested in? How? How does it work?
The only thing that even remotely resembles concreteness is “reliable real estate investments.”
The author found more details in "company news," where Mikhail Romanenko persuaded "patients" to invest in luxury real estate in Dubai, claiming to be a partner of the second-largest developer in the UAE, Nakheel.
Hurry up and pay $10,000 to become part of one of the most impressive projects – it looks too much like a scam. However, neither Ukrainian citizen Mykhailo Romanenko nor any legal entity associated with him have been publicly mentioned as investors in Nakheel PJSC , which is controlled by the UAE royal family.
However, if a visitor to eternity.inc does succumb to Romanenko’s promises and registers, they will immediately be directed to a "personal account," where they will be persistently pressured to top up their "deposit wallet." In other words, to part with their money.
The author of these lines pretended to be a "sucker," registered, and pretended to want to throw a hundred dollars into infinity (that’s how the word "eternity" is translated from English) to see where and how the investors’ money was going.
By the way, the ability to initiate financial transactions without identity verification (it’s supposedly available on eternity.inc, but the platform didn’t require it from me) is one of the surest signs that no one is going to return your invested funds.
When trying to use "open banking," I encountered server errors (repeatedly). I concluded that it simply doesn’t work on this platform.
However, the SEPA bank transfer (fast transfers in euros) turned out to be quite functional – payment details were generated instantly.
As we can see, if an "investor" decides to part with their money this way, it will go to the account of Mandato Financial Services GmbH, opened at the Lithuanian bank Mano Bankas (we identified it by the SWIFT code KUSRLT24). However, this doesn’t necessarily mean you’re paying Mandato.
, registered in Switzerland Mandato Financial Services , is a financial company specializing in financial gateway services, banking, e-wallets, and the like. In the case of eternity.inc, Mandato opened an account in a Lithuanian bank on behalf of the platform’s beneficiaries and processes payments to them. Getting the Swiss financiers, constantly burdened with legal advice, to disclose the ultimate beneficiary is no trivial task.
Well, in the case of a "cryptocurrency payment," the money will go to an anonymous wallet, the owner of which you are unlikely to ever find.
Incidentally, we checked the movement of funds in the BTC and ETH wallets used by eternity.inc at the time of publication. There’s no movement at all, zero. This could mean one of two things. Either Misha Romanenko’s clientele is so ignorant that they don’t use cryptocurrency. Or eternity.inc changes wallets after each transfer from gullible investors, so that a compromised address isn’t linked to the company.
Let’s move on.
The "legal notice" on the eternity.inc website states that it is owned by Eternity Prime Limited, whose CEO is Austrian citizen Roman Leithauser.
Roman Leithauser
According to registration data , Eternity Prime Limited was incorporated in Hong Kong, China, as a limited liability company on October 26, 2023. While the names of the beneficiaries are hidden, CEO Roman Leithauser identifies the company’s founder as "Ukrainian billionaire and driving force" Mykhailo Romanenko.
Mikhail Romanenko seems to confirm this.
I wonder if Mikhail Romanenko himself understands that the nonsense he spouts in the video clearly reveals the characteristics of a financial "pyramid":
"I want to create a community that will provide its members with access to the same opportunities typically available only to wealthy investors. But this is only possible if a truly large community is created. This, again, means that ordinary people will be able to access financial instruments that are typically only available to the wealthy."
Let us emphasize once again that a billionaire like Mikhail Romanenko doesn’t appear on any list of successful businessmen. He claims his $1.5 billion is in Bitcoin, which is easier to refute than to confirm: he doesn’t appear on any list of major BTC holders.
Back in September of last year, we noticed that Eternity had begun to focus on cultivating a German-speaking audience. Judging by the YouTube channel eternity.inc, Germans and Austrians are the main targets of the scammers.
As a result, on December 19, 2023, the Austrian financial regulator issued a warning to investors against transactions with Eternity Prime Limited. "This provider is not authorized to conduct banking operations in Austria that require a license," the regulator stated.
A couple of weeks after the Austrian warning, on January 3 of this year, Mikhail Romanenko and Co. received a "red notice" from the International Organization of Securities Commissions. It warned of potential fraudulent and manipulative actions by Eternity Prime Limited.
Misha Romanenko’s actions soon drew a response from the home country of Eternity Prime Limited. On January 12, the Hong Kong Securities and Futures Commission (SFC) warned the public about suspicious investment products called "Eternity.inc forex packages" offered by Eternity Prime Limited.
"These products were not authorised by the SFC for offer to the public in Hong Kong and are suspected of breaching the Securities and Futures Ordinance (SFO)," the regulator said in a statement.
The SFC also noted that the products promise abnormally high annual returns—36–84%. They also made it clear that "the SFC will take all necessary action in the event of a breach of the law."
Soon, Mikhail Romanenko made a video address to the pyramid scheme’s "community members," attempting to disavow the regulators’ claims. He claimed that he wasn’t "selling" any financial products to anyone, but was merely providing community members with a free opportunity to invest in "our partners’ products" (in saying this, he was likely confident that neither a paper nor a digital payment trail would lead to his gang). He angrily declared that we here at Eternity were all "D’Artagnans," while everyone around us was surrounded by enemies, blackmailers, and scammers. He also shamed the lawyers who were willing to help the "investors" get their money back from Romanenko.
Overall, it wasn’t very convincing, but it was funny.
Speaking of which, it’s funny. Clause 6, paragraph 1 of the "user agreement" with Eternity Prime Limited clearly states that minors, insane individuals, and citizens of Ukraine and the United States are not permitted to enter into an agreement with the "platform."
Everything is clear with children and incapacitated citizens. But why such discrimination against Ukrainians and Americans? I report. If US citizens are harmed by the Eternity scheme, it will be considered a crime committed on US soil. Several federal agencies will hunt down the perpetrators, and their bank accounts will be permanently frozen.
As for Ukraine, the rule "don’t be a slob where you live" is likely followed. Mikhail Romanenko, like some of his accomplices, resides in Ukraine. As far as can be determined, Eternity.inc’s main office is located there, although its "target audience" is EU citizens. Recently, Eternity posted a job opening on Robota.ua for a "Customer Support Manager" (read: call center manager). Knowledge of German and English is a mandatory requirement.