[Update: 2022.03.02]
As of March 2, 2022, the Ukrainian government has raised $50.93 million in crypto donations. The Ukrainian government has received the most donations, followed by the UkraineDAO and the Come Back Alive foundation. The Ukrainian government is now also accepting Polkadot (DOT), in addition to Bitcoin (BTC), Ether (ETH), and Tether (USDT). Within 24 hours, the Ukrainian government’s DOT wallet received over $6 million in donations. Donations in DOT can be sent to the following wallet address: 1x8aa2N2Ar9SQweJv9vsuZn3WYDHu7gMQu1RePjZuBe33Hv.
New amongst the top 5 organizations receiving donations is Unchain Ukraine was launched on February 25, 2022. Unchain Ukraine is a global crypto fund-raising campaign created by blockchain activists to support NGOs such as Voices of Children, Vostok SOS, Project CURE, International Medical Corps, and the Polish Center for International Aid. So far, it has received support from various crypto and DeFi companies such as Polygon, Solana, Yearn. Finance, NEAR Protocol, and Celo amongst others.
Organizations that have received the most donations (in USD):
- The Ukrainian government - $24.86 million
- UkraineDAO - $10.40 million
- Come Back Alive foundation: $8.13 million
- Binance Charity’s Ukraine Emergency Relief Fund: $6.99 million
- Unchain Ukraine Campaign: $840,000
Merkle Science is continuously monitoring the situation and is tracking crypto donations made to Ukraine on an ongoing basis. We have created a special dashboard that is dedicated to analyzing the donations. For easier understanding and clarity, we have bifurcated the donations based on cryptocurrencies donated and entities receiving donations.
According to our on-chain data, the organizations have received over $18 million in ETH, $16 million in BTC, and $6 million in BNB and BEP. Interestingly, more donations are being made using ETH, DOT, and BNB, as the transactions on these networks are faster and cheaper in comparison to the Bitcoin network.
Figure 1: Donations volume share by currency
Amidst the Russian attacks on Kyiv and cyberattacks against Ukraine’s banking network, several crowdfunding efforts have cropped up in support of Ukrainian efforts, including crowdfunding directly in support of the Ukrainian army as well as various non-profit organizations. So far, nearly over $36 million ($36.3 million as of March 1) in crypto has been donated.
Merkle Science identified 13 crypto addresses requesting donations from Ukrainian supporters. Out of the 13 addresses, six are Bitcoin addresses, five are Ethereum addresses, one is a BNB Chain address, and one is a Litecoin address.
The Ukrainian government has received the most donations so far to support the nation’s army as a result of its direct appeals through its official Twitter account, urging people to make cryptocurrency donations. The Return Alive Foundation (also known as Come Back Alive Foundation) has received the second most donations by value.
Further, decentralized autonomous organizations (DAO) have also been formed to support the Ukrainian army. UkraineDAO, a fundraising effort coordinated by members of the investment group PleasrDAO, the NFT studio Trippy Labs, and the Russian art collective Pussy Riot, has already raised $6.8 million in Ethereum-based tokens. Binance Charity also set up a Ukraine Emergency Relief Fund, which has raised $6.6 million thus far.
Figure 1. Cryptocurrency donations received by organization as of March 1
Merkle Science’s on-chain analysis (as of February 28, 2022)
A. Ukrainian Government
As a part of its crowdfunding efforts, Ukrainian officials are directly asking for crypto donations. The official Twitter account of the Ukrainian government on Saturday posted addresses for two crypto wallets: one accepting BTC and the other taking ETH and USDT.
The BTC address published in Ukraine’s official Twitter handle is 357a3So9CbsNfBBgFYACGvxxS6tMaDoa1P (labelled as wallet A1). A1 received approximately 114.5329 BTC ($4,496,503) and has sent out 98.0691 BTC ($3,798,057). The wallet currently has a standing balance of 16.4638 BTC ($623,839).
The earliest transaction on A1 was made on February 20, 2022. So far, all incoming and outgoing funds have been received from and sent to unidentified entities. There have been a total of 6,295 incoming transactions and 9 outgoing transactions. All the incoming funds were received between February 20 and February 28, 2022.
ETH address 0x165CD37b4C644C2921454429E7F9358d18A45e14 (labeled as wallet A2) was published in the official Ukraine Twitter handle. In total, 7,323 incoming transactions and 4 outgoing transactions were done using A2. The address received approximately $7,167,956.24 from 20 different ERC-20 tokens such as ETH, USDC, AAVE, and SHIB. Further, close to $6,722,224 were sent out from this address.
All transactions took place between February 26, 2022, to February 28, 2022.
Figure 2: Breakdown of ERC-20 tokens sent as donations to A2
B. The Return Alive Foundation
The Return Alive Foundation raises funds to support the Ukrainian forces with supplies, equipment, and training and to generally strengthen the country’s defence capabilities. It also operates a news source that tries to stop the flow of propaganda and disinformation.
BTC address bc1qkd5az2ml7dk5j5h672yhxmhmxe9tuf97j39fm6 (labelled as wallet B1) was taken from Savelife, a website backed by the foundation.
B1 has received approximately 181.0469 BTC ($7,086,625.62) and sent approximately 44.4105 BTC ($1,733,537.07). It currently has a standing balance of 136.6364 BTC ($5,177,371.81). In total, 4,725 incoming transactions and 22 outgoing transactions have been done from the wallet. Approximately 98% of the total incoming funds — 177.2414 BTC ($6,756,314.33) — have been received at this address between February 8, 2022, and February 28, 2022. The address was most active during this period, it received 4,677 incoming transactions, which makes up 99% of the total incoming transactions to this address.
B1 received funds from multiple exchanges, services, coin mixers, gambling services and untagged addresses. The address received approximately $189.74 from a mining pool, $8,570.55 from gambling services, $9,635.56 from coin mixing services, $125,547 from exchanges, $2,928.93 from services such as Sygnia, Paxful, and Commotion. The remaining $6,069,642.51 is from untagged entities. Further, more than 87% ($125,302.84) of the funds were indirectly sent to a popular crypto exchange.
C. Centre for Research of Signs of Crimes Against the National Security of Ukraine
Centre for Research of Signs of Crimes Against the National Security of Ukraine (Myrotvorets) is a website that researches and publishes personal information of people whose actions have the signs of crime against the national security of Ukraine, peace, human security, and the international law.
BTC address 16isQMNsnVn15kbJwzUHXPgiGKvrj7EFQ (labelled as C1) was obtained from the organization’s official website. To date, C1 has had 59 incoming transactions and 17 outgoing transactions. Approximately 80% of the incoming funds worth around $214,554 were received in August and September 2021, when the address was most actively receiving funds. Roughly, 73% of the outgoing funds, amounting to $143,143 were withdrawn in November 2021 when the address was most actively withdrawing funds.
Around 9% of the incoming funds were received directly from a well-known crypto exchange and Wasabi, a coin mixing service. Further, approximately 31% of the outgoing funds were directly and 14% of the outgoing funds were sent indirectly to the same exchange.
D. Belarusian Cyber Partisans
The Cyber Partisans is a Belarusian decentralized anonymous hacktivist collective, which emerged in September 2020. The hacktivists, in their official Twitter account, have stated, that they will be working with volunteer hackers to help Ukraine’s military fight back in the cyber domain. According to their Twitter account, the hackers are accepting donations in the following Bitcoin address: bc1qw4yqlzgjxnl9dtzchxj7nkjdlw6uz2gdkp0679 (labelled as wallet D1).
D1 received approximately 1.837 BTC ($87,041.38) and sent out roughly 1.7647 BTC ($79,178.57). It currently has 0.0723 BTC ($2,739.56) as a standing balance. 73 incoming transactions and 30 outgoing transactions have been done from D1. The earliest transaction was done on August 13, 2021, and the most recent one was recorded on Feb 27, 2022. Around 72% ($61,419) of the incoming transaction were received in September 2021, which is when the address was most actively receiving funds. Further, the majority of the outgoing funds were also withdrawn in September 2021 — roughly 65% ($51,866.71) of the funds were withdrawn in September 2021.
The organization has a second BTC address bc1qvf5jeswp0tu9s7kuf5uzjges49gnf0637asa8l (labeled as D2) that was also taken from the organization’s official Twitter handle. This address has received approximately 2.3576 BTC ($108,124.71) and sent roughly 2.1465 BTC ($126,883.86). It currently has a balance of 0.2111 BTC ($7,998.92).
The earliest transaction was on Aug 19, 2021, and the latest transaction in the address was recorded on Feb 28, 2022. Totally, 60 incoming transactions and 15 outgoing transactions have been done from D2. Around 82% of the incoming funds — $83,700 — were received in September 2021. Alternatively, close to 88% of the outgoing funds — $112,798 —were withdrawn in October 2021 when the address was most actively withdrawing funds.
Approximately 16% of the incoming funds were received directly and 3% were received indirectly from prominent crypto exchanges. Roughly, 23% of the outgoing funds were indirectly sent from D2 to a well-known exchange.
E. Ukrainian Cyber Alliance
The Ukrainian Cyber Alliance is a collective of Ukrainian hacktivists. The alliance emerged from the collaboration merges of popular cyber activist groups FalconsFlame, Trinity, RUH8, and cyber activists from the Cyberhunt group. The group’s main objective is to counter Russian aggression in Ukraine.
BTC wallet address 19fMSv8ULjoBR7UNgNGuTrqoQmwiZEa63v (labelled as wallet E1) was obtained from the Ukrainian Cyber Alliance’s official Facebook page. In total there have been 17 incoming transactions and 9 outgoing transactions out of E1. The earliest transaction was recorded on January 29, 2020, while the most recent one is recorded on February 28, 2022.
In total, E1 has received 0.1585 BTC ($1,946.86) and has sent out 0.1585 BTC ($1,361.88). Presently E1 holds 0.0148 BTC ($560.8). Also, 67% of the total incoming transactions were sourced directly from gambling activities, coin mixing services and some well-known exchanges, while 1% of transactions were received indirectly from the Ukrainian exchange Kuna Exchange.
Additionally, E1 had an 8% direct outgoing exposure, whereby funds were sent out directly using the payment gateway service CoinPayment. Around 11% of the outgoing funds were indirectly sent to prominent exchanges.
Ethereum wallet address 0x34b5593122bae35c54a066e93317cef214f4f224 (labelled as wallet E2) was also obtained from the Ukrainian Cyber Alliance Facebook group.
In total, E2 has had 35 incoming transactions and 85 outgoing transactions. The earliest transaction was recorded on Jan 29, 2020, and the latest transaction was done on May 13, 2021. According to Merkle Science’s analysis, E2 received funds between Jan 29, 2020, and May 8, 2021, and sent out funds between January 29, 2020, and May 13, 2021. E2 was most active in May 2021, wherein, it received close to $11,900 worth of crypto and sent out around $15,981, bringing up the total transactions to $27,000.
To date, E2 has received approximately 15,892.287 USDT and 14.367 ETH amounting to approximately $34,752.2 and has sent out 15,892.287 USDT and 14.367 ETH worth around $35,210.2. E2 currently has no outstanding balance, since, all funds have been withdrawn from E2. Further, 99% of the incoming funds were received directly from two popular crypto exchanges. Approximately 3% of the outgoing funds were also directly sent to exchanges.
Litecoin address LXbrmweackHwtBaZrk1n3REsifa8mRhDCs (labelled as wallet E3) was obtained from the Ukrainian Cyber Alliance Facebook page. In total E3 has received roughly 253.3542 LTC ($61,035.39) and has sent out around 253.3542 LTC ($54,065.4). Since all the funds have been withdrawn from E3, it has 0 outstanding balances.
The earliest transaction was done on March 4, 2020, and the latest transaction was recorded on February 28, 2022. In total, 56 incoming transactions and 51 outgoing transactions have been done out of E3. Approximately, 9.5% of funds amounting to $2,956 were received between January 4, 2022, and February 28, 2022. Similarly, around 9.5% of the outgoing funds, worth $2,964.91 were withdrawn between January 4, 2022, and February 28, 2022. E3 was most active in the months of April and May 2021, when it transacted approximately 72% of the total transaction ($83,698.79) — out of these $47,895.79 were from incoming transactions and $35,803 were from outgoing transactions.