From Playboy and London fintech to the frontlines in Ukraine. The curious case of Vladimir Lyaporov

The case against Lyaporov, who led the Russian Playboy from 2007 to 2009, was initiated in November 2024 following a report by REN TV, an ultra-loyalist TV station. He was charged with fraud under Part 4 of Article 159 of the Russian Criminal Code, which allows for up to 10 years in prison.

The report cited investors whom Lyaporov allegedly convinced to put money into a London-based company with the promise of high returns of 30–50%. The company then was supposed to operate as a litigation financier, lending money to other firms for legal costs in exchange for a share of the potential winnings.

While REN TV described the operation as a financial pyramid scheme involving eight victims and losses exceeding 200 million rubles (about $2.4 million), the official criminal case cites a smaller, though still substantial, sum of “more than 50 million rubles”, or about $600,000.

According to the TASS state news agency, authorities had frozen approximately 30 million rubles ($360,000) in Lyaporov’s accounts, and he was under a travel ban. TASS reports that he admitted guilt in one criminal episode out of five before later retracting his testimony.

Following Wagner Group’s recruitment tactics, the Russian government now offers people under criminal investigation a way to halt legal proceedings against them by signing a contract with the army to fight on the frontlines.

Lyaporov, according to his LinkedIn profile, is an alumnus of London Business School with a PhD in Political Science. Over the past few years, Lyaporov has cultivated a sophisticated international image as the founder and CEO of Luxetech, a data science and investment firm he launched in London in the summer of 2022. His company aimed to “reinvent risk evaluation” by using artificial intelligence to analyze “non-commercial” factors like regulatory changes, social movements, and legal filings to guide investors.

In a May 2025 article, Luxetech unveiled its “high-performance strategy,” PolitX, which it claimed was “fuelled by political intelligence”. The strategy was designed to identify growth factors triggered by political actions, a concept Lyaporov had been developing since 2021. The firm reported that a pilot program for PolitX, which focused heavily on Asian markets, had yielded an exceptional +30% return in its first quarter.