The analyst who estimated libel damages for the infamous Hulk Hogan libel trial says that a Russian entrepreneur lost $60 million to $170 million due to BuzzFeed posting the unverified anti-Trump dossier in January 2017.

The assessment came from damages expert Jeff Anderson, who has been retained by CEO Aleksej Gubarev in his libel suit against BuzzFeed and editor Ben Smith. Mr. Anderson’s multi-million-dollar estimate was revealed on Wednesday in a pre-trial hearing in U.S. District Court in Florida.

Financed by the Democratic Party and produced by ex-British spy Christopher Steele, the unverified dossier accused Mr. Gubarev of participating in the hacking of Democrats during the 2016 election. Mr. Steele’s sources said Mr. Gubarev, through his XBT Holdings, attacked the computers with spy ware and porn.

Mr. Gubarev immediately denied the charge. BuzzFeed apologized and redacted his name from the last of Mr. Steele’s 17 memos meant to bring down the candidacy of Donald Trump. Mr. Steele said Mr. Gubarev did the hacking under duress from FSB, Russia’s internal intelligence arm.

The Russian-born Mr. Gubarev founded and nurtured a company that today supplies web-basing servers to over 40,000 clients globally. Why Mr. Steele’s Russian sources accused Mr. Gubarev remains unclear.

His lawyers have contended the dossier greatly damaged him financially, and on Tuesday affixed a number for a jury to consider.

Mr. Anderson’s expert analysis was used by pro-wrestler Mr. Hogan in his successful 2016 suit against Gawker, a trial also held in Floria.

Gawker published sex tapes of the celebrity in 2012. A jury awarded him $140 million. Gawker went bankrupt and a judge awarded Mr. Hogan $31 million from liquidation assets in December 2016.

Mr. Anderson, director of valuation and analytics at Consor Intellectual Asset, testified that that Gawker increased its corporate value by $15 million by posting the private tapes.

He is now in Mr. Gubarev’s legal corner.

Mr. Gubarev also sued Mr. Steele in a London court. Mr. Steele admitted in a filing that he did not verify the unsolicited charges against the capitalist.

BuzzFeed has hired consulting company to try to prove the dossier is true, a move scoffed at by Gubarev attorney Val Gurvits who told The Washington Times there is no evidence because his client is innocent.

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