Meat sells and Onlyfans, the latest online porn empire, is revealed as the business of the century. The company paid 517 million in dividends to its founder, Leonid Radvinsky, between 2021 and 2022. The profits of this social network, with a business model based on subscriptions and with a majority of pornographic content, skyrocketed in the fiscal year that closed in November 2021 at 433 million euros.
The main shareholder of Onlyfans is the Ukrainian businessman Leonid Radvinsky. With experience in managing web pages with pornographic content, since 2018 he controls 75% of what was then an unknown internet portal, founded two years earlier. Radvinsky was known for setting up, in the early days of the network, websites that gave access to hacked passwords to pornographic sites. And in 2004 he was cleared of a complaint by Amazon and Microsoft for fraudulently using their brands in spam emails.
Radvinsky has received two payments from Onlyfans in recent months. One of 284 million in 2021, for which he benefited from the results of 2020, and another of 233 million so far in 2022. This means that Radvinsky has pocketed one million euros a day so far this year. dividends of this social network, known for offering subscription plans, for between 5 dollars and 50 dollars per month, which users pay for viewing the content published by other users. Although its majority content is pornographic, it also has videos of fitness instructors or musicians, among others. And it has recently attracted many celebrities, who offer content beyond that of a sexual nature.
Onlyfans business skyrocketed during the pandemic, when it doubled the number of subscribers and increased content creators by more than a third. It obtained revenues of 932 million, compared to the previous 358 million, in the fiscal year that ended in November 2021. And profits were seven times higher than those of the previous year, according to the financial report published by Fenix International, the holding company owner of the social network.
Redvinsky acquired the firm from its two founders in 2018 Tim Stokely, a British entrepreneur, and his father Guy, a former investment banker in the City. They completely disassociated themselves from the company last year.
His next objective is to overcome the suspicions of investors to the content. This year he decided to ban porn to attract investors. And, in addition, due to the pressure exerted by its main financing banks: BNY Mellon, JP Morgan and MetroBank. A measure that he decided to reverse a few days later, but that ended up causing the departure of its founder, who until then remained as CEO.
The economic arguments are obvious and it is looking for rounds of financing to become a unicorn: reach a valuation of more than one billion dollars. It is also exploring other alternatives, such as going public in a merger with a SPAC.
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