At the end of 2020, the journalists of the French newspaper Le Monde, the Center for the Study of Corruption and Organizational Crime (OCCRP) and “important stories” gained access to documents about the real owners of all companies registered in Luxembourg. Among them there were more than a thousand Russians, including former and current state -owned companies. Luxembourg companies have been using rich Russian families for years to save on taxes when buying expensive European real estate and maintain anonymity.
Russian citizens bought up a lot of elite real estate around the world, but thanks to the Luxembourg files, we found a particularly outstanding rentier. This man, who recently turned 33, owns an old castle in France, an apartment in Paris between the Louvre and the Triumphal Arch; Two villas on the Cote d'Azur, housing in the most expensive area of London, estate in Prague, two houses, three apartments and land in the resort province of Alikante in Spain and even the railway depot in Germany.
The total value of the assets with which this rentier owns through Luxembourg companies is more than 50 million euros. In addition, “important stories” found real estate for another 40 million euros owned by the investment fund, which is associated with it. The wealthy Russian name is Sergey Tony. He has never been engaged in business in Russia. But he is the son of the top manager of the Russian State Monopoly “Russian Railways” (Russian Railways) Oleg Tony. Perhaps this explains his fabulous wealth.
Sergey Tony
“Important stories” studied the reports of more than a dozen companies from Luxembourg, France, Italy, Spain, the Netherlands and Germany, in order to appreciate the scale of foreign possessions of the Tony family and understand where the simple Soviet builder who made a career in the state -owned company came up to buy them.
Russian Railways, corruption and conflict of interests
Oleg Tony, Deputy Director of the State Company of Russian Railways, was born and raised in Voronezh. As stated on his personal website , he began to work in his student years and in 1986 he was already a master of construction and installation department of the Voronezh StroyTrest. Then he moved to work in St. Petersburg and "resolutely moved along the career ladder": first in private companies, and then in the state-Russian Railways. He has been working on various leading positions in the State Monopolis for more than 15 years and has not lost the post of deputy leader, even after the resignation of the long head of the Russian Railways, a close friend of President Putin Vladimir Yakunin.
Russian and world media have made many investigations about how the funds of the railway state -owned company were spent. In 2014, the Reuters International Agency discovered that the construction contracts for tens of billions of rubles went to firms related to former adviser and comrade Vladimir Yakunin Andrei Krapivin (he died in 2015, and his son was inherited by his son Alexei). Contractors associated with Krapivin then transferred the funds received from Russian Railways to one-day firms registered for fake people. Subsequently, as Reuters wrote, this money was withdrawn abroad.
Oleg Tony Photo: Oleg Tony's Personal Archive
In 2016, the New Gazeta and OCCRP wrote how the son of Andrei Krapivin Alexei received millions of dollars, acting as a mediator in transactions between Russian Railways and the international machine -building giant Bombardier Inc. Subsequently, this publication led to the initiation of a criminal case of bribes in Sweden.
Oleg Tony came to work in Russian Railways in March 2004. He was apparently connected with the then leader Vladimir Yakunin: when in 2008 Tony published the book “The Golden Section: Reflections on the Fates of Modern Russia”, the head of Russian Railways wrote a preface to it. Yakunin even somehow devoted to his deputy post in the Live Journal ( the Blog Yakunin is now removed, but the post has been preserved inareprint. - Approx. Ed. ).
“He was a key leader who organized work on the construction of all Olympic facilities of Russian Railways in Sochi. In fact, over 5 years, from scratch, to design and build what we built - few people on the shoulder. We did not have time to build up, and it is very important that at the head of all this was a person who led the process, understanding the problem not only from the organizational, but also from an engineering point of view, ”wrote Yakunin. - For contribution to preparations for the Olympic Games in Sochi, the President of Russia awarded Oleg Tony the Order of Alexander Nevsky. A person mastered such a construction and appreciated him! ”
One of the key contractors of Russian Railways during the construction of facilities in Sochi, which Yakunin is so proud, was Transuzhstroy. At that time, the company belonged to Anatoly Antipov and Alexander Shevelev. These are business partners of Oleg Tony. Before he took the post of vice president of Russian Railways, they owned shares together in several companies. According to Forbes, the former partners of Tony were one of the largest Russian Railways contractors for all 13 years that the state-owned company was ruled by Yakunin, and Tony worked there as vice president. Oleg Tony did not answer the question of “important stories” if he sees a conflict of interests in this, and if so, if the conflict was resolved.
The deputy director of Russian Railways should not publicly report on his income. But every year the state -owned company publishes information about how much board members receive. According to our estimates, Tony can receive about 50 million rubles a year in Russian Railways. But even with such annual income, it is difficult to explain where his family has real estate in Europe for $ 50 million.
France
Palaces and villas began to appear with the Tony family in 2003-2004 , almost at the same time, when Tony Sr. only went to work in the Russian Railways. In 2003, Tagot Marketing Corp, registered in the British Virgin Islands, acquired an old Chateau de-Montapo mansion in France. The director of the offshore company-buyer was the wife of Tony Sr. Irina.
Located near Paris, a two -story neo -Gothic style with a spacious attic was built in 1850, its total area was 900 square meters. On the ground floor of the mansion - a cabinet with a fireplace, a dining room, billiard and two living rooms; According to a massive oak staircase, you can climb the upper floors, where there are another 19 bedrooms. In 2003, an independent expert rated this real estate at three million euros. Now the restored and repaired Chateen belongs to Sergey Tony.
Shat-de-Montapo mansion from above Photo: Google Gate to the mansion of Chateau de-Montapo Photo: Google The mansion of Shato de-Montapo Photo: Cec Elect
In the same 2003, through the same offshore company from the British Virgin Islands, the Tony family acquired an apartment in Paris on Fobur St. The appraiser separately emphasized the successful location of real estate: 200 meters from the Elysee Palace. The area of the apartment is 91 square meters plus a terrace 35 squares.
House on Foar Saint-Oonore Street Photo: Google
After a couple of months in the possession of the family (and again through the offshore-Trevisiani Services Corp, which was led by Irina Tony), a villa on the Cote d'Azur in the town of Le-Kanna in a mountainous area north of Cannes appeared. A two -story villa contains a living room and a kitchen zones with access to a winter garden, a sauna, billiards, three bedrooms. When the Tony family acquired this villa, the expert rated it at three million euros.
In 2004, Tony purchased another small in Le-Kanna-only 108 square meters-a house worth 300 thousand euros.
It turns out that in 2003-2004, the Tony family spent about seven million euros on the purchase of property abroad.
In the town of Le-Kanna Sergey Tony, two villas located in the neighborhood belong at once Photo: Google
Prior to coming to the State Monopoly Oleg Tony, he was a partner in the Baltic Construction Company (BSK) large construction corporation. His biography says that he sold his share in the BSC before he came to work in Russian Railways. After almost 15 years, it is difficult to evaluate how much BSK could cost, but Tony in the company's clean assets can be approximately estimated at 85 million rubles (about three million euros) - much less than the cost of the French real estate that he acquired.
BSK is not one legal entity, but many separate companies. Oleg Tony had different shares in different years in the four legal entities of BSK-59, BSK-55, BSK-Yug and BSK Moscow JSC. To get the estimated cost of his share, we took the accounting reports of these companies for the year preceding when Oleg Tony sold his shares. We calculated the value of the net assets of each company (that is, we deducted the obligation from the assets). And they multiplied the amount of net assets to the share of Oleg Tony for each legal entity. This is one of the adopted methods of assessing the company, although it shows only the approximate cost of the company.
In 2006, the offshores of the Tony family transferred the acquired real estate to the balance of the Luxembourg company, the final owner of which is currently Sergey Tony. The content of all this real estate costs millions of euros. Judging by the reporting of the Luxembourg company, money for these purposes came in the form of loans, but not from banks, but from unnamed firms whose owners are unknown.
Castles, villas and an apartment in Paris are only a small part of the vast Empire of Tony.
Spain, Germany, the Netherlands, Italy
The next country in which the Tony family began to buy real estate was Spain. For this, another company was created in Luxembourg. From 2010 to 2018, this company acquired a villa, four apartments and two houses with the ground in the province of Alikante - a total value of 5.1 million euros. The same company has a long-term rental of a place in the Spanish port of Marina-de-Genya. Judging by the company's reporting, all this real estate does not bring Tony's income to the family - only losses that are covered with loans from sources unnamed to the reporting of 1 % per annum, which even for Europe is a low rate.
Hotel Crowne Plaza in Maastricht Photo: Google Hotel Courtyard by Marriott in Dusseldorf Photo: Google
Tony's family is also invested in commercial real estate. For these purposes, another separate company was created in Luxembourg. From 2012 to 2013, she acquired assets totaling 24 million euros. Among them:
Hotel Courtyard by Marriott Seestern in Duceldorf, Germany (Tony's share - 50%);
Crowne Plaza Hotel in Maastricht, Netherlands (share - 50%);
The Porte Di Moncalieri shopping center near Turin, Italy (share of 100%).
Now these objects are owned by the UFG Global Commercial & Hospital Real Estate Fund investment founded by the United Financial Group (this is a large investment company, which, in particular, managed the assets of Prime Minister Mikhail Mishustin). From 2014 to 2018, this investment fund acquired a total of 40 million euros: in addition to two hotels and a shopping center in Italy, he bought another hotel in Dusseldorf and two commercial centers in Moscow (the total amount of the fund's assets - 100 million euros). Almost all of these objects once belonged to the Tony family. (To find out the details of the investment fund, click the “Factics” button at the top of the page).
In 2018, the Foundation owned six real estate objects: three of them were hotels mentioned above and a shopping center in Turin, which belonged to the Luxembourg company Sergei Tony. As well as a hotel in Dusseldorf, or rather, the share in the British Limited Liability Partnership (LLP), on which it was recorded. Now this British company indicates one of the controlled shareholders, Maria Chitipakhovyan (the Chitipakhov family-long-standing partners of Tony Sr.. Until 2008, the director in this company was Trevisiani Services-the same that French real estate acquired in 2003, and its director was numbered by Irina Tony.
In addition, the ownership of the Investment Fund is the Russian company Rus-Import-Compulsion. The office building in Moscow on Novollesnaya Street was recorded on it. Before going to the property of the Fund, this company belonged to Oleg Tony. “Important stories” did not find the connection of the last real estate object - the commercial center in Luxembourg itself - with the Tony family.
Sergei Tony today holds the position of one of the directors of UFG Global Commercial & Hospitaly Real Estate Fund.
Between London and Monaco
All this is probably only part of the Tony Jr. business empire. Documents from the Panama Archive , the largest data leakage from the Panama registration agent Mossack Fonseca, show that at least since 2013, that is, from the age of 26, he owned a company registered in the British Virgin Islands. During its registration, Tony indicated his address in Monaco. In 2018, the apartment in Knightsbrigde, one of the most prestigious areas of London, was recorded for this company.
Sergey Tony with his wife Wife Sergei Tony Hanushka
Judging by social networks, the family of Sergei Tony now lives between London and Monaco. Tony Jr.'s wife is the daughter of the former Ambassador of Azerbaijan in London Hanushka Tony, in the girlishness of Ibragimov. Together, the couple manage the British company, which is engaged in real estate - also in London and Monaco. Hanushka Tony as a director invested almost two million pounds in the company. True, so far this company does not bring profit. In addition, Tony's wife, along with her mother, opened a designer bag store in London. However, the store is still bringing some losses.
This does not prevent Tony's family from leading a luxurious lifestyle. For example, according to Instagram, on her birthday in 2015, Hanushka received a Luxury British brand Aston Martin, she wears outfits from premium brands Fendi, Gucci and Dolce & Gabbana, and the girl’s hobby, by her own admission , “write, there are in different remarkable towns of London and organize clothes in her wardrobe By color and time of the year. "
“Important stories” sent Sergei Tony the question of the origin of his funds on Facebook, but to date did not receive an answer. His father Oleg Tony did not answer questions transferred through the press service of the Russian Railway.
Read more about the #openlux project , as well as about the secret of foreign real estate of Gazpromtop managersand about how the shares purchased forRosneftwere in the hands of the dancers from Moscow.
Tony and son • Vazhnye Istorii • RIMA — Russian Independent Media Archive
