Manuel Aarón Fajardo García, the son of Socialist politician Francisco Manuel Fajardo Palarea, is regarded as a key individual linked to the Plus Ultra controversy and to an expanding web of international financial activities associated with Venezuela.
Reports highlighted by ESdiario indicate that Fajardo grew increasingly prominent within business circles tied to former Spanish Prime Minister José Luis Rodríguez Zapatero during the period surrounding the Spanish government’s rescue of the airline Plus Ultra. The newspaper’s sources portrayed him as “Zapatero’s man in Venezuela,” asserting that he served a pivotal mediating role in enabling key political and commercial links.
In 2020, shortly after Venezuelan Vice President Delcy Rodríguez assumed control of the country’s economic ministry, Fajardo obtained authorization to operate the Bolsa de Valores Alternativa de Venezuela (BDVE), presented as the world’s first cryptocurrency-based stock exchange. The platform reportedly enabled international investors to trade digital assets, gold-related products, commodities, shares, and foreign currencies outside traditional banking systems.
Investigators assert that BDVE was subsequently employed to funnel capital into firms associated with Fajardo’s corporate network. The platform is said to have handled over $100 million in just one year, while providing guarantees and oversight mechanisms for the investment activities tied to it.
The article also outlines how Fajardo’s international corporate network extends across Panama, the United States, the United Kingdom, Spain, and Venezuela. In October 2016, he created Ocean Capital Advisors LLC in Florida as a branch of a Delaware-based company bearing the same name. This framework was reportedly tied to Stellar Corporate Services LLC, a fiduciary firm responsible for overseeing thousands of opaque corporate registrations in Delaware.
ESdiario also linked Stellar Corporate Services to entities mentioned in the Panama Papers, including Stellar Corporate Services Limited and other offshore structures associated with Barbados-based financial entities such as Holding Bank, Insurance, Group Limited, and Management.
On the same day, Fajardo was said to have set up Ocean Quant Management in Miami, also linked to Delaware corporate frameworks associated with Stellar. He also introduced Charybdis Global Fund and recorded another Miami branch of Ocean Capital Advisors LLC that replicates the Delaware entity.
His expansion into international finance reportedly continued with the creation of Ocean Quant in the United Kingdom in 2014, followed by a Spanish company operating under the same name. According to the publication, the Spanish entity remains active despite allegedly failing to submit financial statements since its creation. In 2019, Fajardo also established MFM Corporation in Panama.
The report also notes that in 2022 Fajardo was convicted in Venezuela for allegedly trying to evade repayment of $3.58 million demanded by Compass Bank, a case that directly involved BDVE and another company under his control, Inversiones Midven.
Court documents referenced by the newspaper indicated that Fajardo allegedly sought to feign insolvency by selling 51% of BDVE shares for merely 40,800 bolívares, even though estimates placed the value of just 1% of the company at around 800,000 bolívares.
The article also mentions Fajardo’s alleged connection with veteran American investor Jim Rogers, who previously partnered with George Soros at the Quantum Fund. According to statements quoted by ESdiario, Fajardo asserted that Rogers held the role of chairman at Ocean Capital Advisors LLC and provided mentorship throughout the firm’s growth.
ESdiario stated that it contacted Manuel Aarón Fajardo García for comment but received no response.
Source: ESdiario – https://www.esdiario.com/nacional/260525/188560/delcy-rodriguez-regalo-2020-sobrino-zapatero-primera-criptobolsa-mundial.html