The Wall Street Journal: Behind Tether's $1.5 billion throw, the "middleman" makes a lot of money.

Tether, the issuer behind the world's most popular cryptocurrency USDT, is conducting a major acquisition. It has acquired a majority stake in Northern Data, an artificial intelligence company, and Blackrock Neurotech, a brain-machine chip company. It is worth noting that the transactions between Tether and these two companies were facilitated by the same German investor, and the results of the transactions recommended by this investor are mixed.

Stable Coin USDT currently has a circulating Market Cap of over 115 billion US dollars, thanks to the substantial Interest Rate, Tether can earn approximately 4 billion US dollars in income annually from the US Treasury bonds supporting USDT.

Tether has hired technology investor and entrepreneur Christian Angermayer to help invest this huge sum of money. The versatile financier has also made a fortune through some unconventional investments, including psychedelics, dinosaur fossils, and alternatives to the stimulants used by athletes during the Olympic Games.

So far, Angermayer has helped Tether invest about $1.5 billion in two companies in which he holds shares, and has also earned hefty commissions from the transactions. The companies they invested in have been facing perennial losses.

In the past year, Tether acquisitioned the majority of Northern Data. Northern Data is a German data center operator that is in deficit and aspires to become an artificial intelligence company. Another company acquired by Tether, Blackrock Neurotech, is a struggling brain-machine implant company based in Utah, which competes with Elon Musk's Neuralink.

Tether did not respond to our request for comment. A spokesperson for Northern Data said that the rise in the company's revenue proves that its strategic investments in artificial intelligence are successful.

Tether is not the first cryptocurrency company to make big investments. Previously, during its peak, the cryptocurrency exchange FTX spent $1 billion to acquire a BTC mining company on the Kazakh grasslands and $500 million to acquire the artificial intelligence company Anthropic.

In October last year, Cryptocurrency generally pumped, and a Cryptocurrency offline trading store in Hong Kong displayed the Exchange Rate of USDT

Angermayer's controversial track record

Angermayer's family office, Apeiron Investment Group, located in Malta, refers talent for investors and companies. Apeiron has recommended some large investment deals for cash-rich buyers, but these investments eventually performed poorly.

In 2017, Angermayer's family office helped HNA Group, a Chinese conglomerate, become the largest shareholder of the struggling German bank Deutsche Bank. After the transaction was completed, the bank's stock price further declined. Several years later, HNA Group sold part of its shares due to cash shortages. Ultimately, heavily indebted and subject to Chinese government scrutiny, HNA Group filed for bankruptcy.

HNA Group is headquartered in Haikou, China, and the group filed for bankruptcy in 2021.

Angermayer then began to cooperate with the Japanese enterprise SoftBank Group, which raised the largest venture capital fund in the world. He introduced Wirecard, a German payment processor, to SoftBank, which was then facing accounting fraud allegations.

SoftBank stabilized the situation for Wirecard through the issuance of $1 billion convertible bonds. Both SoftBank and Wirecard paid millions of dollars in intermediary fees to Angermayer's family office.

After receiving investment from SoftBank for several months, Wirecard has signed a long-term cooperation protocol with cybersecurity company Cyan AG. Angermayer and a business partner hold 27% of the shares in Cyan AG. This business partner has also served as a representative of Hainan Airlines on the board of Deutsche Bank. In this cooperation, Angermayer is responsible for introducing executives from Cyan and Wirecard to each other.

A year after the deal with SoftBank, Wirecard collapsed due to an accounting scandal. SoftBank sold the bonds to investors, who suffered heavy losses.

A source said that Apeiron received compensation as an intermediary for the transaction, but did not participate in the negotiations or the transaction itself. The source said Angermayer also facilitated several smaller, less controversial deals.

Recently, Angermayer and Apeiron have started focusing on what he calls the "important agenda for the next human society" and have built a portfolio in areas such as cryptocurrency, longevity, and psychedelics. With the support of technology investor Peter Thiel, Angermayer has co-founded Enhanced Games to advocate for the use of performance-enhancing drugs in sports events.

Angermayer and Northern Data

Angermayer often wears flamboyant shirts adorned with mushroom patterns. He has a tattoo of the chemical symbol for psilocybin (a neurotoxin with psychedelic properties) on his forearm. He has hosted lavish birthday parties in 17th-century Austrian palaces and at an encryption conference in the Bahamas. On Instagram, Angermayer showcases his collection of dinosaur fossils and ancient sculptures.

Angermayer's personal life and work sometimes intertwine. In 2022, Apeiron marketed a new fund to investors called "Apeiron Jurassic Fund One," aiming to raise $30 million to invest in dinosaur fossils. The promotional materials draft stated that the fund would utilize "a unique global bounty hunter network," starting with Angermayer's fossil collection, including a young T-Rex and a Liangzhou. The fund was eventually abandoned.

Angermayer's other investments include a significant stake in Northern Data, a BTC mining company listed in Germany, which recently shifted towards artificial intelligence cloud hosting services. Northern Data acquisitioned two CryptocurrencyMining companies in which Angermayer held shares, and Angermayer obtained a partial stake in the new company. One of them was co-founded by a former employee of his family's wealth management office.

Afterwards, Angermayer began to raise funds for Northern Data and charged a service fee. Apeiron also charged Northern Data a fee for introducing investors. The fees included sponsorship and promotion at an encryption carnival in the Bahamas. At this carnival, former One Direction star Liam Payne performed shirtless.

A passage in the Northern Data data center, which is an abandoned Norwegian mine

According to Northern Data's financial statements, the company paid 840,000 euros (about 940,000 U.S. dollars) to Apeiron in 2022 for fundraising activities. Northern Data stated that the acquisition of these two cryptocurrency mining companies resulted in a loss of 420 million euros. According to current and former employees, coupled with the widespread decline in encryption assets in 2022, Northern Data's financial situation is precarious at the beginning of 2023.

A spokesperson for Northern Data said that the company has been operating normally, and the financial audit results show that the company's capital is currently sufficient.

Angermayer found financially strong Tether

Tether made its first investment in Northern Data in spring 2023, acquiring the company's shares for €32.3 million. According to insiders, Tether hopes to keep its involvement confidential. Angermayer received a fee equivalent to 5% of the transaction value, marking his first compensation for brokering a deal between the two companies.

A few months later, Tether acquired 48 million euros worth of Northern Data shares. Similarly, Northern Data did not publicly acknowledge Tether as its investor. A spokesperson for Northern Data stated that both companies had met the disclosure requirements for the transaction.

Angermayer received another 5% fee from the second transaction. According to invoices reviewed by The Wall Street Journal, he received a total of 4 million euros in compensation for these two transactions.

Thereafter, Tether began to openly assist Northern Data in the field of artificial intelligence. Tether founded an Irish company named DaMoon and lent Northern Data 400 million euros to purchase advanced Nvidia H100 processors.

*Tether CEO Paolo Ardoino called the company's investment in Northern Data a 'perfect deal'.

Subsequently, Northern Data took over DaMoon. In return, Tether received new issuance of Northern Data stocks. Paolo Ardoino, CEO of Tether, described the investment in Northern Data as a "perfect deal" in a podcast. He praised the company's management, structure, and team.

After that, Tether provided Northern Data with a credit line of 575 million euros, which has now been fully utilized. These transactions made Tether the controlling shareholder of Northern Data. Last month, Northern Data announced plans to raise another 214 million euros (of which 110 million euros will come from Tether) to purchase more processors.

A spokesperson for Northern Data declined to comment on whether Angermayer or Apeiron received fees for subsequent transactions. He stated that any fees paid by the company have been disclosed in accordance with legal and accounting requirements.

Based in the British Virgin Islands, Tether has achieved tremendous success. Investors like it because its Cryptocurrency is stable and its value is always 1 US dollar. Its Liquidity is good, making it very suitable for commercial transactions. According to government indictments, USDT is also widely used in drug smuggling, terrorist organizations, and sanctioned countries. Government and bank officials have stated that regulatory agencies have strengthened their scrutiny, and some banks have refused to do business with Tether.

Investors like Tether's Cryptocurrency because of its stable value

Tether states that it collaborates with global law enforcement agencies and has established and maintained a world-class Compliance process to prevent Money Laundering, terrorist financing, and other risks.

Angermayer also helped Tether invest in another company, Blackrock Neurotech. He is the Co-Chairman and largest shareholder of Blackrock Neurotech, a brain-machine interface manufacturer. Brain-machine interface is a small electronic device implanted in the brains of paralyzed patients. This Salt Lake City-based company has been developing this technology since 2008.

In 2021, Apeiron led a $10 million financing round for Blackrock Neurotech. Former employees said that while Angermayer was chairman of the board, Blackrock Neurotech wanted to take advantage of the industry hype sparked by Musk's Neuralink and actively promote the company's listing.

However, Blackrock Neurotech's business development has encountered difficulties. Former employees said that after receiving investment, Blackrock Neurotech expanded rapidly, with the number of employees more than doubled and new business lines developed. However, the company then carried out a series of layoffs in 2022 and 2023.

Last summer, Angermayer and Apeiron led a $37 million investment round in Blackrock Neurotech. Former employees said the company burned through more cash and then further reduced its workforce.

Blackrock Neurotech has not yet responded to a request for comment.

In April of this year, Tether acquired a majority stake in Blackrock Neurotech for 200 million US dollars, with a valuation of 3.5 billion US dollars. Tether stated that its business scope has expanded from simply providing digital dollar alternatives to brain chips, which will "empower humanity in the process of future evolution".

An entrance to a data center in western Norway, which houses the Northern Data computing center

The stock of Northern Data is traded on the German securities market, and is currently considering listing in the United States. According to a slide seen by The Wall Street Journal, some bankers pushing for Northern Data's U.S. listing say the company could be worth $20 billion in a few years. Northern Data declined to comment on the potential U.S. listing.