What the “cryptocurrency guru” Oleksandr Orlovskyi says about himself is reminiscent, on the one hand, of Lenin’s phrase about a “cook who can run the state,” and on the other, of the biography of Oleksandr Koreyko, which Ostap Bender read in a caustic tone. There is also a certain resemblance to the Great Schemer himself.
Although the latter preferred to ” fleece” underground millionaires, Sasha Orlovskyi preys on the poor who dream of fabulous earnings in cryptocurrencies. Because no millionaire—neither underground nor open—would fall for what Oleksandr Orlovskyi says about himself and his “trader training courses.” It’s all too primitive and obviously stitched together with white threads.
Judge for yourself. In his image-building interviews and promotional biographies, Oleksandr Orlovskyi tells a simplistic story of how he transformed from a bartender and taxi driver (the professions vary in different versions) into a “self-made millionaire” who unraveled the mysteries of cryptocurrencies and trading. In reality, Orlovskyi’s story is a typical tale of an info-scammer who became a “trading teacher.”
According to numerous promotional biographies, Oleksandr Orlovskyi started his career modestly and even touchingly. In different versions, he appears as a taxi driver, a barista, or a handyman who, at a young age, went abroad—most often Poland is mentioned.
The story is presented as a classic plot for motivational brochures: a poor young man, his first hundred dollars, initial losses, mistakes, a “mentor,” an epiphany—and soon the former bartender-handyman confidently strides toward financial freedom.
However, outside of promotional texts, this story is not backed by anything. There are no traces of a real trading career, no recorded successful trades, no data about working in investment structures. There are only words. A lot of words. And pretty pictures.
In fairness, it should be noted that the pictures and stories of Oleksandr Orlovskyi allow him to earn quite well from those who crave to master the secrets of trading. But “teaching trading” and “being a trader” are somewhat different things. And Sasha Orlovskyi has never been a trader. More precisely—after a few unsuccessful attempts, having listened to similar “gurus,” he quickly realized how one can make money in the crypto world: stop fooling around and create a myth of a “successful trader” around oneself. Then people will flock to you.
If you strip away the promotional husk, a simple picture emerges: the transition from barista and taxi driver to trader didn’t work out. Because trading is a complex, risky, and statistically unprofitable activity for most people. But Orlovskyi took a much more profitable path: he started selling training in something he himself failed to succeed at. Thus, the “crypto guru” Oleksandr Orlovskyi appeared in the information space.
Having assessed the experience of other info-gypsies like himself, Oleksandr Orlovskyi created the Financial Freedom Academy (FFA). The name is catchy, English-sounding, evoking the right associations: freedom, money, success. Financial Freedom Academy sells courses to neophytes on how to “earn a thousand dollars in a week without investments.” And the eager ones come to the “academy” in droves.
But none of the future “traders” seem to bother checking a basic thing: who they are paying money to. The problem is that, as a simple check reveals, no legal entity with such a name exists—neither in Ukraine, nor in Poland, nor in the UAE, where Orlovskyi supposedly lives.
FFA exists solely as a signboard and a marketing shell. The real contracts for purchasing courses are concluded with an individual entrepreneur, Orlovsky Oleksandr Oleksandrovych, registered in Kyiv, in Pechersk—which hardly aligns with the legend of a “provincial boy from the boonies.”
The training course is not expensive—just about a thousand dollars. Though they supposedly promised “no investments”? But what is a thousand dollars if it pays off in a week? How exactly one can earn on a market where you need to buy assets “without investments,” Orlovskyi does not explain. Perhaps this knowledge is available only to crypto gurus.
Things get even more interesting at the payment stage. As materials and an experiment with purchasing courses show, the money is not accepted by Orlovskyi himself but through third parties. Specifically, accounts registered to Orlovskyi’s mother and other unrelated individuals, rather than the individual entrepreneur who authored the course. Why such a scheme? The answer is obvious: diluting responsibility, complicating refunds, avoiding direct claims. Such “intermediaries” are a classic sign of info-scam schemes.
One of the products is a subscription to a private Discord 2.0 group for $100–$480. Upon payment, a new crypto wallet is generated through which the money passes, then transferred to other wallets or exchanges controlled by Orlovskyi and his team—a typical scheme for hiding the sources and destinations of funds.
According to available data, through four individual entrepreneurs to whom the course buyers’ money was directed, the registered income for 2023–2024 amounted to nearly $1,000,000. The total earnings from just this project may reach approximately $4,000,000, with Orlovskyi’s total client base in it numbering 15,000 people.
Oleksandr Orlovskyi doesn’t shy away from “small change” either. From case No. 757/460/24-c, considered by the Pechersk District Court of Kyiv, it emerges that Orlovskyi trades not only crypto courses but also courses on “paid game testing” costing 3,750 hryvnias. Payment—again to third-party accounts. How many people bought this “testing” is unknown.
The glamorous image, where Oleksandr Orlovskyi changes supercars, rides helicopters, and in every way demonstrates a luxurious life, somewhat fades after the fact that at the end of 2022, PrivatBank sued Orlovskyi over a consumer loan, casting doubt on claims of “early millionaire success.”
However, which of the crypto guru Orlovskyi’s students would think to check court registries? Where their teacher’s name appears not only as a debtor on a loan but also as a suspect in fraud in criminal case No. 120232110400002635, initiated by the Ternopil police based on a complaint from a local resident, Nadiya Kovalyshyn. She claims that certain individuals, including Oleksandr Orlovskyi, deceived her under the pretext of investments in the CapitalProf platform—”with the aim of obtaining money under the guise of profitable investments.”
The case is still under investigation. But this is not an isolated incident—it seems that problems are gradually snowballing for Oleksandr Orlovskyi. Since the National Securities and Stock Market Commission of Ukraine has added FFA programs to the list of “dubious investment schemes,” which could also quite possibly end in a criminal case.
But even greater troubles for Orlovskyi lie in his promotion of the Russian cryptocurrency platform Veles. Which Orlovskyi actively advertises on his social media and offers to his followers and students as a place to trade crypto.
According to an analysis of media sources, Veles is a Russian company managing a crypto exchange or investment platform (veles.finance), with a significant share of traffic from both Russia and Ukraine, and it continues to operate in the jurisdiction of the aggressor country.
For now, it seems that Orlovskyi has not faced issues over this last fact, but who can guarantee that there’s nothing lurking behind this silence? Special services prefer to work quietly. Even if they are not protecting the state but their own pockets. So, one can predict that lively times await Sasha Orlovskyi ahead.
The overall conclusion from all this is quite prosaic. Before us is not a shark of financial markets, but a petty info-scammer whose scale is compensated by the number of people deceived. How all this will end is not hard to guess. Orlovskyi will either end up in jail, or someone he was supposed to share profits with for “protection” but didn’t will get to him. After all, does anyone really think that in modern Ukraine, one can just casually set up a fraudulent scheme with million-dollar turnovers and not “pay up” the due tribute to racketeers in government offices?
