Quite a mystery, isn’t it? The only plausible thing I can think of is some kind of money laundering scheme; not that I can figure out how it would work.

This. I look forward to the next chapter.

Simple: Speculation in OTC stocks. You can see this sort of behavior all the time if you look for it.

Companies that have never made a profit, have a sketchy business model (blockchain + psilocybin is not an unusual combination), and suddenly take off from less than $1 to $10+ on pure speculation. Usually some sketchy press releases go out too but once the price gets going it is all speculation that feeds itself.