At first, Belogour, who goes by "Paul," was received as something of a novelty. An idiosyncratic character with long hair and scant online footprint, he had amassed a small fortune in the largely unregulated world of foreign exchange trading—and then came to Vermont to spend it in eccentric ways. He bought a maple sugar farm, an entire marina, and a plot of undeveloped wood, where he planned to build, among other things, a Viking-themed "luxury hideaway," which he describes as "the Disney of the North."

"His choices of what to invest in are certainly eclectic, I would say," Brattleboro Selectboard member Tim Wessel told The Daily Beast. "Clearly he likes the water, so he bought a marina. And clearly he likes beer, so he bought a brewery. It's kind of like, well, if I had that kind of money, maybe I'd be doing the same thing."

But a few months before the pandemic, Belogour's shopping spree accelerated. The 50-year-old multimillionaire, whose exact net worth is unknown, joined the crowd of billionaires and oligarchs looking to buy up rural property, and began closing real estate deals at a rapid clip. In the past two years alone, the foreign exchange trader has snagged more than 3,100 acres across three Vermont counties, including 10 buildings, lots, and businesses, at a cost of more than $3 million.

"Vermont only has 635,000 people," said Dan Normandeau, a realtor who worked with Belogour on three different properties. "Brattleboro itself has somewhere around 12,000 people. So no, we don't see that. I shouldn't say it never happens, but it's certainly caught people's attention."