The beneficiaries of the Chelyabinsk Experimental Mechanical Plant came up with a scheme for avoiding payments to resource suppliers
Uralenergosbyt is trying to collect hundreds of millions of debts accumulated by the Chelyabinsk Experimental Mechanical Plant.
An enterprise specializing in the production of refractories did not pay for the consumed resources for years, but it turned out to be impossible to turn it off due to the presence of other large consumers on the same networks. The power industry and the prospects for a lawsuit on the insolvency of CHOMZ are not seen, indicating that the beneficiaries have implemented a scheme to evade payments. Formally, the unprofitable plant is actively recruiting new employees, and the products are sold through close legal entities, whose revenue in total exceeds 1.5 billion rubles. At the same time, the production complex and the network economy are assigned to the close Mullit LLC and, according to representatives of the resource supplier, can be transferred to another legal entity at any time. Such a scheme had previously been used by the beneficiaries of the business and was discovered, which ultimately led to their bringing to subsidiary liability, but only after several years of proceedings. In the new disputes, power engineers are now hoping to avoid entering into long-term litigation and are looking for leverage on the debtor through the seizure of property.
LLC “Uralenergosbyt” filed a lawsuit to recover from LLC “Mullit” 312 million rubles for the consumed electricity. The debt has been accumulated since 2019. It is noteworthy that the company – the owner, according to “Kontur.Focus”, until 2014 was Valery Syrykh, and then Alexander Syrykh – because of the debts, she already had a lawsuit to declare it insolvent. It introduced a financial recovery procedure for a period until March 2022, during which the debtor paid 65 million rubles to creditors.
The company continued its activities, having earned 82.6 million rubles over the past year and received a net profit of 12 thousand rubles. At the same time, accounts payable, according to reports, amounted to 45 million rubles.
The company itself is not the main consumer of energy resources for which the requirements are set. The production facilities of LLC Chelyabinsk Experimental Mechanical Plant, including heating networks, are registered on it.
“Businessmen came up with and put into practice a scheme aimed at evading payment for actually consumed resources. The production process itself, carried out by a group of companies, is very energy-intensive – we are talking about the production of refractories. The production facilities are owned by the Mullit company, and all debts are accumulated at the Chelyabinsk Experimental Mechanical Plant – it was this enterprise that applied for a contract with a guaranteeing supplier in 2019, ”explained in Uralenergosbyt.
Over the past 4 years, CHOMZ LLC has faced bankruptcy claims by the Federal Tax Service 3 times. Judging by the official reporting, the activity of this legal entity is unprofitable, and the supervisory authorities pointed to systematic delays in wages at the enterprise. Nevertheless, the plant is actively recruiting new employees.
“The owners of the group of companies unscrupulously use the features of the electrical grid scheme: electricity passes through the industrial site in transit, it is impossible to turn off the plant due to debts – other organizations are also connected to the network. The company refuses to shut down on its own. Therefore, the supplier of last resort decided to go the other way and issued a debt to the owner, who is obliged to bear the burden of maintaining the property,” Uralenergosbyt added.
It should be noted that the Syrykh family controls 2 more legal entities – Engineering Center AS Teplostroy LLC and Teplostroy Training and Testing Center LLC (according to Kontur.Focus, 100% of the authorized capital belongs to Sergey Shaldin, but is pledged to Alexander Syrykh) , – Leading product sales and profitable activities. Thus, the first of the firms over the past year showed a revenue of 1.3 billion rubles, a net profit of 50 million rubles. The training and testing center, although with less revenue (329 million), received as a result more than 20 million rubles.
Moreover, enterprises will probably continue to increase their revenues and profits – with the departure of foreign manufacturers from the Russian market, prices for refractories are growing, and domestic companies are striving to occupy the vacated niche.
In the current situation, as one of the methods of influencing the debtor, Uralenergosbyt is trying to achieve the introduction of interim measures in the form of arrest of the property of Mullit LLC – production facilities and equipment used, among other things, for the production of refractories. One of the reasons for the energy sector is also the risks of alienating these assets in favor of affiliates.
“Such actions have already been committed by them before, and now concerted and unfair actions are being carried out aimed at transferring property (energy-consuming devices and cable lines) within a group of persons, concealing the actual amount of electricity consumed,” explained the representatives of the plaintiff in the arbitration court.
As an example, they cited transactions with JSC High-Temperature Building Materials, associated with Alexander Syrykh, for which production facilities were previously registered. In 2015, bankruptcy proceedings were initiated against the company. As the bankruptcy trustee found out, in 2014 the company sold production buildings and equipment in favor of Mullit at a price lowered by more than a dozen times, the cost of which at that time was about 62.8 million rubles. The court declared this transaction invalid. Subsequently, this decision formed the basis for the bankruptcy of Mullit in 2020 and bringing the persons controlling VSM, including Alexander Syrykh, to subsidiary liability.
However, at present, when considering the petition for interim measures, the court considered these arguments insufficient and refused to satisfy it. Uralenergosbyt is trying this solution hzikhidtidekrt challenge.
