Rosneft bought an asset with a rich and difficult past

Bashneft changed the controlling shareholder for the fourth time. In 2003, the shares of key enterprises of the FEC of Bashkortostan bought out seven limited liability companies created by the Urals Rakhimov, the son of the then head of the region. In 2009, Rakhimov Jr. lost these shares of AFK System, controlled by Vladimir Evtushenkov. The transaction was estimated at $ 2.5 billion. "System" calculated with the Urals Rakhimov, having received a loan on VTB. After the transition of Bashneft under the control of Yevtushenkov, the Ufa oil company sharply increased the payment of dividends, the lion's share of which entered the accounts of enterprises affiliated with AFK System, which allowed it to repay VTB loan ahead of schedule.

But in September 2014, Vladimir Yevtushenkov became a defendant in a criminal case on theft of shares of enterprises in the FEC of Bashkortostan, and on October 30, 2014, the Moscow Arbitration Court in the lawsuit of the Prosecutor General’s Office issued a 71.6% of the Bashneft shares from AFK System and its daughters, and the Invest system, and the return of this asset to state property to state property (Soon, Yevtushenkov changed the measure of restraint from the “house arrest” to “Subscribing on the Lieutenant”, and on January 16, 2016 they closed the criminal case against the businessman “due to the lack of corpus delicti”).

"Documents can be destroyed"

Now the story of Bashneft is laiding another cool turn. On Wednesday, October 12, the Ufa oil company has passed under the control of Rosneft, which bought a 50.08% of the Bashneft shares belonging to the state for 329.7 billion rubles. The very next day, October 13, the powers of Alexander Korsik, who headed Bashneft since April 2011, were terminated. Andrei Shishkin was appointed the new manager of the company, who worked as Vice President Rosneft until last Thursday.

On the same day, the process of “transferring cases” to the new owner began. The procedure was more like a special operation. In the offices of Bashneft in Moscow and Ufa, people in civilian clothes appeared, who strengthened the protection and access control, turned off the Internet and began to withdraw documents. On Thursday evening, RIA Novosti quoted a source in the Ufa office of Bashneft: “As we understood, they suddenly appeared to prevent any financial documents.”

The fears of the new owner that some documents of the financial and economic activities of Bashneft may be destroyed, not groundless. Six months ago, on April 19, 2016, in the journalistic investigation “One can enter the same pipe” in Novaya Gazeta, I spoke about the whole series of Bashneft contracts for the supply of both finished products and raw oil. These agreements for hundreds of billions of rubles gave the basis for the assumption that the company is seriously contracted, that even the strategic raw materials have not yet been obtained by Bashneft for years to come.

I collected information for the April publication for several months. He flew on a business trip to Ufa, met personally or recorded a dozen interviews on the phone. And many of my interlocutors expressed the idea, figuratively formed by one of the middle -sized managers of Bashneft, who compared the work of an oil company with a juice factory that has a fruit garden, but all the apples collected in its own garden sold, and bought apples in a neighboring area for the proceeds. At the same time, it sells its apples cheaper than buying from neighbors ...

For example, in January 2016, Bashneft entered into a contract for 81 billion rubles for the supply of raw oil with an offshore oil trader Concept Oil Services Limited, registered in Gong Kong. In 2013, Bashneft had already signed a similar agreement with this novice of the oil market. And immediately in the amount of 2.3 billion dollars. Even then, there was conversations that officials of the Ministry of Energy could be involved in the company of Concept Oil Services Limited, who lubricated the deal with the novice of the oil market, on the basis of much more profitable Hong Kong company, rather than the Russian.

Business on gaskets

Contracts with LUKOIL-reservations LLC LLC LLC also look no less strange. When Bashneft-Polus LLC, a subsidiary of an Ufa company, almost all of the oil produced at the Trebs and Titov deposit in the Nenets Autonomous Okrug of the Arkhangelsk Region, sells LUKOIL-reserve-RUBNNEFTEPRODEN. And then she buys oil from her to load her own refineries.

At the same time, in 2015, in the chain “Bashneft-Polus”-“Lukoil-reserv-me-product”-“Bashneft” also “gaskets” appeared. These are the Exim Group company (with which contracts for 85 billion rubles were concluded), Arctic Bunker (85 billion rubles), Trubond Limited (98.5 billion rubles), Minko Enterprise Limited and Trad Nafta (83 billion rubles). All these contracts were signed in November 2014, before the return of the Bashneft shares to state property. And judging by the expert opinion of the specialists of the GKU of oil and gas to them. Gubkina (the document is at the disposal of the editorial office) , these contracts were concluded not on market conditions and could cause damage to the economic interests of Bashneft.

About a week after the publication “You can enter the same pipe”, the editorial office received a letter from businessman Yevgeny Mulukov, who proposed submitting information and documents explaining the details of the appearance of contracts for the supply of oil and oil products concluded by Bashneft in November 2014.

I admit that Mulukov’s proposal was interested, but not so much that, having adjusted the plans, to immediately continue the journalistic investigation about the activities of Bashneft. First of all, because there was not the slightest desire to meet the “business entities”. The fact is that, having made a certificate, I found out that Yevgeny Mulukov is one of the defendants in court lawsuit with his former companion, businessman Mikhail Golub, who have been drawn to the London International Arbitration Court (LCIA) and the East Caribbean Supreme Court for several years (the jurisdiction of the British Virgin Islands).

But soon a letter came to the editorial office from lawyer Elena Demina, who, in the interests of her client, Mikhail Golub, demanded to remove the “new” investigation from the site “You can enter the same pipe twice” and publish a refutation of information “not corresponding to reality”.

I had to return to the topic "Bashneft".

He wrote to lawyer Elena Demina a letter with a request to organize an interview with Mikhail Golub. He honestly warned that he addressed his opponent - Evgeny Mulukov with a similar request. But Demina replied that she considers my attention to the pigeon “too close” and that “... at the moment I can be ... useful only in discussing the issue of removing your article and publishing a refutation of inaccurate and defaming the business reputation of information about my truster”.

The editorial office refused to delete the publication. Although she provided Mikhail Golub with the opportunity to exercise the “right to an answer”, provided for by the legislation governing the activities of the media.

But this pigeon was not enough. The businessman demanded to pay him 30 million rubles by applying to the Moscow Arbitration Court with a lawsuit to recover half of this amount from the editorial office of Novaya Gazeta and the same amount from me as the author of the publication “You can enter the same pipe”.

Comparative analysis

The information set forth in a lawsuit sent to the Russian court is sharply different from the testimony given to them, but in the courts outside Russia.

For example, in the lawsuit filed in the Moscow Arbitration Court and a preliminary meeting on which is scheduled for October 26, Golub claims that the publication of the “new” “casts into question the opinion of the plaintiff as a person who has an impeccable reputation. The plaintiff has a positive image ... "

But outside of Russia, the reputation of Mikhail Goluba is not so impeccable. For example, long before the publication of Novaya Gazeta, on August 6, 2015, a court order was issued “On the seizure of property/assets” of Golub. And the businessman, having appealed this judicial document, regarded it as a commercial activity that significantly complicates him.

I emphasize: I learned about the lawsuit of Mikhail Goluba outside of Russia after the publication was released "one can enter the same pipe twice." From Evgeny Mulukov and his Russian lawyer Fedor Trusov, who, unlike Mikhail Golub and his representative Elena Demina, did not dodge an interview “under the recorder”.

And it was Mulukov who told me that “before the return of the oil company to state property, with firms controlled by the pigeon, Bashneft concluded a number of“ burdensome contracts ”worth more than 400 billion rubles.”

“From May 23 to 30, 2015, a court session was held in the London International Arbitration Court (LCIA) as part of the process initiated by Mikhail Golub,” said Mulukov. -During the cross-interrogation of a dove and top managers (number of companies. - I.M .), they were forced to admit that it was the pigeon that controls all these companies.

According to Mulukov, Lcia has not yet made the final court decision, and he has not yet the right to disclose all the information voiced during the hearing.

Evgeny Mulukov refers to the confidentiality of the trials going outside Russia. But we managed to obtain the written testimony of Mikhail Goluba sent to them to the East Caribbean Supreme Court.

“I intend to give these testimonies as written testimony given by oath ...” - Polub writes and further on 152 machine pages, it gives information that differs from those that he brought in a lawsuit filed in the Moscow Arbitration Court in relation to Novaya Gazeta and me as the author of the publication “You can enter the same pipe”.

In the Russian lawsuit, the pigeon writes that "... the plaintiff is not related to EXIM GROUP LLC. The plaintiff is also not a participant in Arctic Bunker LLC. In addition, the plaintiff does not control the company Trubond Limited, “Minko Enterprise Limited”, which is discussed in the article. ” And in written testimony to the foreign court, the court paints in detail what it has to do with these companies, how exclusive contracts with Lukoil and Bashneft concluded through his contacts.

For example, in paragraphs 24-29, Golub complains that on November 24, 2014, the Russian President signed a “deofshorization law”, requiring citizens of the Russian Federation that have shares in “controlled investment companies” (KIK) to announce their participation in these companies, and that the profit of such companies should be considered the taxable profit of the Russian tax resident. ” To avoid the need to pay taxes in Russia, the pigeon and his wife decided to withdraw from among the founders of the offshore company owning the company Trubond Limited. And on December 24, 2014, the asset was rewritten to the daughter of Goluba - Jan Aisner, who is not a tax resident of Russia. I note that the Bashneft contract with Trubond Limited for 98.5 billion rubles was signed at the end of November 2014, when it was Mikhail Golub and his wife who even formally controlled the company.

Mikhail Golub, Mikhail Golub, says about the Trad NaFTA company, which entered into a contract with Bashneft, that he purchased 50% of this company back in March 2003, and on December 27, 2004, he increased his share in the authorized capital of the company to 80%.

About the company Arctic Bunker, Golub writes: “I became a member of Arctic Bunker on September 27, 2014 with a minority share of participation in the amount of 47.5%,” that is, two months before this company concluded a contract with Bashneft for 85 billion rubles.

In written indications in the East Caribbean Supreme Court, Mikhail Golub wrote about his relations with the top managers of Bashneft and Lukoil. For example, that with the ex-head of the Ufa oil company Alexander Korsik, he has been familiar with more than 15 years. And it was Korsik who introduced the pigeon to other managers, who at that time led Bashneft.

These acquaintances came in handy in business. The pigeon writes: “Through my contacts,“ Mingko ”entered into an exclusive agreement with Lukoil to the transshipment of direct -leg gasoline to his terminals in Vysotsk. This led to the receipt by Mingko Tenders and concluding a long -term agreement with Bashneft.

It should be noted that at first there was an agreement on the transshipment of products to terminals in Vysotsk and only then a contract with the Bashneft. And the terminals on the island of Vysotsky in the Vyborg district of the Leningrad region are actually a gate to the European oil product market. Naive question: could the Bashneft and Lukoil directly conclude an agreement on cooperation?

All this somewhat “strange” financial and economic activity of Bashneft and the contracts that we wrote about in the April publication and about which we learned from Evgeny Mulukov and his representative Fedor Trusov could not but interest the new owner. As interested in several State Duma deputies, who sent deputy requests to the General of Russia. For example, Army General Mikhail Moiseev, whose appeal to Yuri Chaika is in the editorial office. And so I was not at all surprised by the nature of the “transfer of affairs” to the new owner, “Rosneft”, more like a sudden special operation.