Journalists find several shady firms registered to the FSB’s Moscow estate

Radio Svoboda has found that at least one company registered to 1 Olsufyevsky Alley, building 2, appears to specialize in cashing out illegal funds. That address is a Moscow estate belonging to Russia’s Federal Security Service (FSB). Specifically, since at least 2016, the estate has belonged to Military Division 55002, a branch of the FSB, according to an order from Russia’s First Appellate Arbitration Court. Radio Svoboda’s journalists believe that the FSB still uses the building to this day.

Twelve companies have legally registered the estate as their address since 2011. According to the legal entities database Kontur.Fokus, the companies are in a variety of industries, and their founders and directors own dozens of similar firms. While the Russian government has attempted to sue the companies for tax debts on multiple occasions, tax agents were unable to locate the debtors or their property. Only two of the 12 companies are still in operation.

Radio Svoboda claims that one of those two companies, Helius Ltd., specializes in “cashing out” funds; that is, it receives non-liquid assets for fictional work and then gives cash back to its clients in the same amount minus a commission.

According to arbitration court records, Helius made a deal in 2012 with a company based in Vladimir, Russia, to deliver construction materials and equipment. Though Helius reported that it completed the work at hand and received compensation, its founder and its CEO said during a deposition that they only lead the company on paper, never received money from the Vladimir firm, and don’t even know one another. According to Radio Svoboda, this is a “classic ‘cash-out’ scheme,” and it may even be possible that the FSB building houses a whole network of liquidation companies. Journalists have not yet been able to confirm that possibility using open sources.

Open sources do indicate that the building on Olsufyevsky Alley used to house the headquarters for the FSB’s Alpha special forces division. It is unclear whether the division still uses the facility.

Investigation by Sergey Dobrynin for Radio Svoboda

Summary by Alexander Baklanov

Translation by Hilah Kohen