StablR, established in April 2023 by Dutch entrepreneur Gijs op de Weegh, has introduced the MiCA-compliant euro stablecoin EURR and secured €3.3 million in seed funding. However, the company’s leadership, notably op de Weegh’s previous role at Payvision, raises significant concerns.
Company Overview and Financial Milestones
StablR Limited, operating from Malta, obtained an e-money institution license in July 2024. The company announced a €3.3 million seed funding round on July 18, 4, with investments from Deribit, Maven 11, Theta Capital, Folkvang, and Blocktech. Notably, the valuation for this funding round was not disclosed, prompting questions about transparency.
As of July 19, 2024, StablR reported issuing 3,200,500 EURR tokens, backed by fiat reserves totaling €3,470,744. While this suggests reserves slightly exceeding the issued tokens, details regarding the composition and location of these reserves remain unspecified. The company’s website asserts that EURR tokens are fully backed by euro assets, but further information is lacking.
Leadership Scrutiny: Gijs op de Weegh’s Tenure at Payvision
Gijs op de Weegh, StablR’s founder and CEO, previously served as COO of Payvision, an Amsterdam-based payment processor. Under his leadership, Payvision expanded into high-risk sectors, including pornography and gambling, and was implicated in facilitating fraudulent online trading platforms.
Between 2015 and 2019, Payvision, led by CEO Rudolf Booker, supported fraudulent schemes associated with cybercriminals Uwe Lenhoff and Gal Barak, laundering funds stolen from investors. These activities resulted in significant investor losses and ongoing legal proceedings.
Investigations revealed that op de Weegh personally signed contracts with operators of these fraudulent platforms. Additionally, Payvision faced allegations of fraud and fund misappropriation from U.S. merchants and partners, leading to multiple lawsuits.
Despite ING acquiring Payvision in 2018 for €360 million, the company’s unethical practices led to its closure in October 2021. The Dutch Central Bank (DNB) identified numerous instances of money laundering misconduct at Payvision and filed a complaint, though the Dutch public prosecutor’s office imposed minimal fines instead of pursuing rigorous legal action.
One notable case involved GPay Ltd, a company within Gal Barak’s cybercrime organization, which laundered money stolen from victims. Despite warnings from financial regulators like the FCA in May 2018, op de Weegh, then Payvision COO, signed a contract with GPay in July 2018. A homeless Bulgarian citizen was appointed as GPay’s managing director, raising questions about the thoroughness of Payvision’s KYC audit.
Implications for StablR
The Malta Financial Services Authority (MFSA) granted StablR an e-money institution license, seemingly overlooking the founder’s controversial past. This raises questions about the due diligence conducted, especially considering that StablR operates from Amsterdam, where its key personnel reside. The decision to obtain a license in Malta, rather than the Netherlands, warrants scrutiny.
The legacy of Payvision, marked by money laundering issues, facilitation of online fraud, and legal disputes, casts a long shadow over StablR. Op de Weegh’s association with these activities raises severe doubts about his suitability to lead a systemically critical stablecoin issuer.
Furthermore, StablR’s Chief Risk & Operations Officer, Corné van der Meijden, also has a Payvision background, having served as CFO until 2020. His involvement in Plutus B.V., linked to op de Weegh, further complicates the trustworthiness of StablR’s leadership.
Transparency and Compliance Concerns
Under the Markets in Crypto-Assets (MiCA) regulation, stablecoins, particularly fiat-backed stablecoins classified as e-money tokens (EMTs), are regarded as system-critical. MiCA established a significance regime for stablecoins in response to concerns about the potential risks these assets pose to financial stability and monetary sovereignty. Thus, it is in the public interest to have full transparency of all stablecoin issuers, such as StablR.
Transparency is certainly not a key feature of StablR. Its whitepaper is not accessible on its website, thus not publicly available. Attempts to request this document via email have gone unanswered, suggesting a lack of transparency and responsiveness. This is particularly troubling for an entity operating in the highly scrutinized stablecoin market.
We found an old whitepaper via Google in which Ralf Wandmacher is still listed as an executive. He also worked for some time as a director in the Dutch Plutus B.V., which was apparently implemented as a holding company via StablR. Wandmacher has since disappeared from the project and from Plutus. Plutus B.V. is located at the same address in Amsterdam (Keizersgracht 452, 1016GD) as the other successor companies of Payvision, which are closely linked to Payvision founder and former CEO Rudolf Booker. Whether Booker is also involved in StablR can only be speculated.
In this whitepaper version 1.1, BDO Technology Advisory Ltd is listed as System Auditor and BDO Malta as Financial Auditor. The cyberfinance rating agency PayRate42 has assigned StablR an Orange Compliance and Orange Risk rating, reflecting these significant concerns. Despite holding an e-money institution license in Malta, the past actions and associations of its leadership cast doubt on its compliance and operational integrity.
Conclusion
StablR’s emergence in the stablecoin market is overshadowed by the controversial history of its leadership, particularly the founder’s association with Payvision’s unethical practices. The lack of transparency and unresolved compliance issues necessitate rigorous regulatory scrutiny to ensure the company’s adherence to ethical standards and to protect investor interests.
FinTelegram invites anyone with additional information about StablR to share their insights via our whistleblowing system, Whistle42. Your contributions can help shed further light on the practices and integrity of this.
