Fraud in Eastern Express

The founder of Baring Vostok Michael Kalvi and top managers of the investment company were detained in Moscow on suspicion of embezzlement of over 2.5 billion rubles. In total, there are six defendants about fraud, they face up to 10 years in prison. The criminal case was opened at the request of the shareholder of the Bank of East Express. The company itself confirmed that criminal prosecution is associated with a conflict around the bank, but emphasized that the actions of law enforcement agencies are not directly related to the activities of Baring Vostok and other portfolio companies.

Recall, Baring Vostok Capital Partners (BVCP) is a company focusing on investments in the CIS and Russia countries. Один из крупнейших и старейших западных фондов прямых инвестиций основан бывшим сотрудником Европейского банка реконструкции и развития (ЕБРР) и инвестбанка Salomon Brothers Майклом Калви в 1994 году.Baring Vostok входит в состав акционеров банка «Восточный», компаний OZON, «Вкусвилл», Etalon Group, Gett и others. H

Philip Delpal / AGN "Moscow" / Photo: Vedyashkin Sergey

For 25 years, BVCP raised six funds for investment in Russian assets totaling $ 3.7 billion. The most famous and successful investment of Baring in Russia is Yandex: in 2000, the Fund bought 35% of the search engine for $ 5.28 million, and earned more than a billion for the subsequent sale of its package. Among the other Baring portfolio companies were Vimpelcom, STS Media, Avito, Tinkoff Bank and others.

Earlier on Friday, the Basmanny Court reported the detention of an investor and five more defendants. Among them are the director of investment Ivan Zyuzin, director of the financial sector Philip Delpal, adviser to the chairman of the board of Norvik Bank PJSC Alexei Kordichev, general director of the First Collection Bureau, Maxim Vladimirov and Vagan Abgaryan, partner of Baring Vostok, specializing in media, real estate and building materials. All detainees are charged with part 4 of Article 159 of the Criminal Code of the Russian Federation (fraud committed by an organized group on an especially large scale), the investigation asks to detain them. This article involves imprisonment for up to ten years. After the release, the freedom of the defendants can be limited even for a term of up to two years (it will not be possible to leave the house at a certain time of the day, go beyond the limits of a certain territory, and so on).

The company reports that “in the framework of the commercial dispute for the Bank of East Express, four employees were detained, including Michael Kalvi. Law enforcement agencies are not directly related to the activities of Baring Vostok and other portfolio companies. Baring Vostok and all portfolio companies of the funds, including East Express, continue to work as usual, Baring Vostok plans to fulfill all the obligations to finance the Bank's capital issued by the Central Bank. ”

According to Interfax with reference to the source, the criminal case was instituted on February 13 on the basis of a statement by the shareholder of East Express, its plot is still unclear, during the preliminary investigation it was established that the suspects committed theft of more than 2.5 billion rubles.

Partner of the Baring Vostok investment fund Vagan Abgaryan / AGN "Moscow" / Photo: Vedyashkin Sergey

Baring is involved in the joint -stock conflict around the Vostochny, the reason for which is an additional emission of 5 billion rubles, which is necessary for the bank to fulfill the standards of the Central Bank. Baring, who became a controlling shareholder of a financial organization by coincidence, does not want to redeem it, but with Artem Avetisyan, the ex-owner of the juniastrum bank, annexed to East in early 2017, there is no money. In November 2017, Vostochny was headed by Dmitry Levin, replacing Alexei Cordichev as chairman of the board, who headed the bank since October 2015. The representative of Vostochny told RBC that in the framework of this case, the bank as the victim was counting on compensation for damage caused to him. The source did not disclose the amount of damage.

Philip Delpal said that he is categorically against detention. “I do not think that a crime has been committed. The documents that I signed do not talk about the opposite. I did not participate in the corporate approval of this deal. My name on the 25th page of this document is not mentioned, I did not give approval. My name is found in the documents only because I work in Baring Vostok, ”Delpal said .

“If this is fraud, then what can I say? No need to violate the legislation, we must figure it out, ” said Anton Siluanov, answering the corresponding question of journalists during the reef.