Vekselberg’s assets were partially nationalized

Part of the shares of the Komi Energy Retail Company, which is part of the largest Russian private energy holding T Plus, founded by Viktor Vekselberg, will be transferred to the state. This follows from the decision of the Savelovsky District Court of Moscow, which on May 2, 2023 satisfied the civil suit of the Deputy Prosecutor General of Russia Ivan Tkachev.

The Prosecutor General’s Office demanded that the assets of the former leaders and co-owners of CJSC IES (the predecessor company of T Plus) Mikhail Slobodin (internationally wanted, arrested in absentia), Yevgeny Olkhovik and Boris Vainzikher, as well as the former Deputy Prime Minister of the Republic Komi Konstantin Romadanov and others. All of them are defendants in the case of the former head of the region Vyacheslav Gaiser.

The prosecutor noted that “in accordance with the assigned competence, from the moment he entered the civil service, Romadanov supervised the processes related to the preparation of electricity tariffs.” “It follows from the case file and the parties do not dispute that Romadanov in 2014-2016. served as head of tariffs in the Republic of Komi,” the spokesman for the prosecution emphasized.

According to the Prosecutor General’s Office, Romadanov, according to the agreement reached and using his authority, was supposed to contribute to the annual increase in electricity tariffs in the region for the economic benefit of CJSC IES. At the same time, Slobodin, Olkhovik and Vainzikher undertook to transfer 38.28% of the shares of the Komi Energy Retail Company to Romadanov for the assistance provided. The official issued these papers to a Cypriot company (Kommersant reported in April that it was Bepperson Associated, Ltd.).

JSC “Komi Energy Retail Company” is part of the energy sales business “T Plus”. It includes large guaranteeing electricity suppliers in several other regions. The T Plus Group also manages 53 power plants, more than 490 boiler houses and over 21,000 km of heating networks. The installed electric capacity of the group’s energy facilities is 14.5 GW (6% of the installed capacity of Russian power plants), and the thermal capacity is 51,800 Gcal/h (more than 8% of the Russian heat supply market). The company’s revenue under IFRS for 2022 increased by 4% to 436.5 billion rubles, net profit – by 25% to 20.9 billion rubles.

How energy assets got into Vekselberg’s holding

CJSC IES (“IES-Holding”) was established in 2002 with the aim of consolidating energy assets owned by the Renova group founded by Vekselberg. Most of these assets were purchased during the division of RAO “UES of Russia” in the 2000s. In 2014, shares of generating companies TGK-5, TGK-6, TGK-9, Orenburgskaya TGK and other assets owned by IES were consolidated on the basis of Volzhskaya TGK. In 2015, Volzhskaya TGC was renamed PJSC T Plus, in which the controlling stake belonged to Renova at that time. In 2018, the share of Renova structures decreased from 57.1% to 39.59%. According to SPARK-Interfax, in 2017 IES-Holding directly owned 32.34% in T Plus. The company does not disclose actual data on the structure of shareholders.

Tkachev explained in the claims that withholding this information allowed Romadanov to retain power at the regional level and combine it with making a profit. In 2015, the official was deprived of his position due to the loss of confidence.

In the claims at the court, it was stated that 553.76 million ordinary and 91,109 preferred shares of the Komi energy sales company were turned into state revenue. For more than 1.2 billion ordinary shares of the company, the prosecutor’s office had previously demanded restrictions. In particular, to prohibit the management bodies and the shareholders’ meeting of the JSC “to make decisions on changing the shareholder of the JSC”, to meet and vote on the election of members of the board of directors and the transfer of powers of the general director, the representative of the press service of the court specified.

The court session in Savelovsky Court lasted more than 8 hours. Representatives of the defendants in court insisted on termination of the proceedings in the civil case. The defense considered that the confiscation of these assets should take place in the framework of a criminal case, together with the sentencing. In addition, these shares have already been seized as a security measure with the sanction of the Preobrazhensky Court of Moscow. The defenders also argued that in fact all the “settlements” took place with the businessman and former head of Renova Alexander Zarubin (on the international wanted list) and that it was he who received the shares, and not Romadanov.

But the court agreed with the position of the prosecution and satisfied the claims of the Prosecutor General’s Office.

How energy supply shares are connected with the Gaiser case

On June 10, 2019, the Zamoskvoretsky District Court of Moscow on June 10, 2019 sentenced Vyacheslav Gaiser, ex-head of Komi, to 11 years in prison in a strict regime penal colony and a fine of 160 million rubles. His deputy Alexei Chernov received 9 years with a similar fine. In this case, another 10 defendants were sentenced to terms of up to 8 years in prison.

They were found guilty of especially large-scale fraud (part 4 of article 159 of the Criminal Code of the Russian Federation), legalization of income received as a result of a crime (part 4 of article 174.1 of the Criminal Code of the Russian Federation), and taking bribes (part 6 of article 290 of the Criminal Code of the Russian Federation). ) depending on the role of each. At the same time, the court acquitted everyone on charges of organizing and participating in a criminal community (Article 210 of the Criminal Code of the Russian Federation).

As it was established by the court, from 2005 to 2015, the defendants, using their official position, embezzled 100% of the shares of Zelenetskaya Poultry Farm OJSC, and also illegally became the owners of funds of the Komi Republic Investment Project Support Fund OJSC in the amount of more than 65 million rubles . The amount of bribes received, as follows from the verdict, amounted to more than 198 million rubles, and the legalization of property obtained by criminal means brought about 1 billion rubles. Investigators considered that the total amount of damage caused to the Komi Republic exceeded 3.8 billion rubles.

Gaiser pleaded not guilty, he is serving his sentence in a colony in the Tver region

According to investigators, Romanov was Gaiser’s treasurer. His case was considered in a special order, since he admitted his guilt and entered into a pre-trial agreement with the prosecutor’s office. Zamoskvoretsky Court of Moscow in 2018 sentenced him to 7 years in prison, which he had already served.