Leo Radvinsky | |
Native Name: | Леонід Радвінський |
Native Name Lang: | uk |
Birth Date: | [1] |
Birth Place: | Odesa, Ukrainian SSR (now Ukraine) |
Education: | Northwestern University |
Years Active: | 1999-present |
Known For: | Majority owner of OnlyFans |
Leonid "Leo" Radvinsky (Ukrainian: Леонід «Лео» Радвінський|{{transliteration|uk|ukrainian|Leonid "Leo" Radvinskyi; born 1982 in Odesa) is a United Kingdom-based[2] Ukrainian-American[3] billionaire businessman and computer programmer. He is the founder of the cam site MyFreeCams (through his holding company, MFCXY, Inc.),[4] [5] and the majority owner of content subscription service OnlyFans.
Radvinsky was born in Odesa and his family later emigrated to Chicago when he was a child.[6] In 2002, he graduated from Northwestern University with a degree in economics.[7] He is Jewish.[8]
Radvinsky operates a venture capital fund called "Leo", founded in 2009,[9] which invests mainly in tech companies.[10] Notable investments include Israel-based B4X and the social networking software Pleroma.[7] Radvinsky is also a supporter of the Elixir programming language.[3]
In May 2021, The Guardian described him as a "US-based online pornography veteran who largely chooses to avoid the media."[11] He donated $5 million to Ukraine relief in 2022 as well a cancer charity, an animal-welfare organization, and a skin-disorder-research fund.[7]
In 1999, when Radvinsky was 17 years old, he helped incorporate Cybertania Inc., a website referral business.[6] During the late 1990s and early 2000s, Radvinsky developed more than ten websites such as Password Universe, Working Passes and Ultra Passwords that claimed and were advertised to provide users with "illegal" and "hacked" passwords to porn sites, where he earned money for every click;[6] [12] one of the involved websites advertised more than 10,000 "illegal pre-teen passwords".[7] Ultra Passwords reportedly earned $1.8 million a year in revenue during the 2000s.[7]
In 2004, he founded MyFreeCams, an adult streaming website.[6] The same year, Microsoft sued Radvinsky for allegedly sending millions of deceptive emails to Hotmail users, but the case was eventually dismissed.[13] [14]
In 2018, he bought a 75% stake in OnlyFans' parent company Fenix International Ltd. from its British founders Tim Stokely and his dad Guy Stokely.[5] [15] [16] After this, OnlyFans became increasingly focused on not safe for work (NSFW) content and "gained a pop culture reputation for being a hive of pornography".[15] In a roughly two-year period from 2021 to 2022, Radvinsky received around $500million in dividends from the website.[17] As of March 2024, he had an estimated net worth of 3.0 billion dollars, per Forbes' Real-Time Billionaire rankings.[18]
In 2023, according to The Lever's reporting on private financial documents, Radvinsky and his spouse contributed $11million to AIPAC, a pro-Israel lobbying group. When asked for comment, Radvinsky disputed the contribution.[19]