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Written by Super User

Published: 20 July 2021

Sergey Bazhanov was accused in absentia of fraud on a particularly large scale

The former owner of the International Bank of St. Petersburg (IBSP) and ex-senator of the Federation Council Sergey Bazhanov was arrested in absentia by the Vyborg District Court of St. Petersburg. The banker, who is located outside Russia, is accused of embezzling funds from a credit institution in the amount of more than 5 billion rubles. Earlier, Sergey Bazhanov was also charged with falsifying financial documents of the IBSP.

 The Vyborg District Court of St. Petersburg has detained in absentia the former chairman of the management Board and ex-owner of IBSP Sergey Bazhanov on charges of fraud on a particularly large scale (part 4 of Article 159 of the Criminal Code of the Russian Federation). This was reported by the joint press service of the courts of St. Petersburg. According to the investigation, the banker, together with unidentified accomplices, stole IBSP money in the amount of over 5.1 billion rubles. For this purpose, deliberately fictitious documents were issued under the guise of making international transactions for the supply of grain crops using irrevocable uncovered letters of credit of the bank. Now Sergey Bazhanov is outside of Russia. As a preventive measure, the court chose arrest for 30 days from the moment of his detention or extradition to the territory of the country.

IBSP lost its license to conduct banking operations in October 2019. The reason for this, as explained in the Central Bank, was a "risky business model", which led to the formation of "a significant amount of problem assets, including derivative financial instruments and unconfirmed (fake) claims against non-resident companies." Before the revocation of the license, the functions of the temporary administration in the bank were performed for six months by the Deposit Insurance Agency, which discovered operations that had signs of asset withdrawal. The "hole" in the bank's capital in 2019 was estimated at 13.1 billion rubles. Triumph JSC, owned by Sergey Bazhanov (owned about 7% of the IBSP), reached the Supreme Court, trying to challenge the loss of the license, but he sided with the Central Bank.

In the statement of the DIA on bringing to subsidiary responsibility the persons controlling the IBSP(available to Kommersant), it is said that the deterioration of the bank's financial situation was influenced by the formation of obviously non-refundable loan debt of legal entities that do not carry out real economic activities.

In addition, it refers to the assignment of non-revalued rights of claims to the company Simec Group Limited in favor of the Cyprus Hervel Investments Limited controlled by the bank. This structure was a minority shareholder of IBSPand belonged to Alexander Zuev, the brother of Sergey Bazhanov's wife, Tatyana Bazhanova. The DIA also reported on the opening and payment of letters of credit, the fulfillment of obligations under which was transferred to Hervel Investments Limited, as well as the hidden lending of IBSPto a Cyprus company through the purchase of credit notes (a type of bonds linked to a credit agreement) by UBS AG London.

Sergey Bazhanov is also a person involved in a criminal case on falsification of financial documents of accounting and reporting of a financial organization (Article 172.1 of the Criminal Code of the Russian Federation), which was initiated in 2019. Earlier this year, he was charged in absentia with committing a crime, and in April he was put on the international wanted list. As part of this case, the second investigative department of the GSU of the Investigation Committee of Russia sought to arrest the banker, but the Primorsky District Court of St. Petersburg refused this request, drawing attention to the fact that he left the country even before the initiation of this criminal case.

The lawyer of Sergey Bazhanov, Alexander Meleshko, told Kommersant that he had appealed the decision to detain the banker in the St. Petersburg City Court.

"Sergey Bazhanov cannot be placed under arrest, since the use of such a preventive measure is prohibited in economic matters, and the accusation of embezzlement is only an excuse to justify the Central Bank's obtaining control over a private credit institution," he believes. In addition, there are no grounds to believe that the banker is hiding from the investigation, which was established by the Primorsky District Court, the lawyer noted, adding that no one was sent to his client for investigative actions. "The judge of the Vyborg District Court looked at the whole process on the phone, which gives the impression that the decision was pushed through the second time," Mr. Meleshko sums up.

Source: Kommersant.ru

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Written by Spec007

Published: 16 July 2021

A court in St. Petersburg arrested ex-senator Sergei Bazhanov in absentia

The Vyborg District Court has arrested in absentia the former president of the International Bank of St. Petersburg (IBSP) Sergey Bazhanov in a fraud case. The investigation believes that the businessman stole more than 5 billion rubles from his bank.

As the joint press service of the courts of St. Petersburg reports on July 16, according to the investigation, no later than October 10, 2017, Bazhanov used irrevocable uncovered letters of credit of the bank allegedly to make international transactions for the supply of grain crops, issued fictitious documents and stole at least 5.1 billion rubles from the IBSP.

Bazhanov is hiding abroad from the preliminary investigation. As a preventive measure, he was arrested for a period of 30 days from the moment of detention or extradition to his homeland.

IBSP's problems began in the fall of 2018, a year later the credit institution was declared bankrupt. At the same time, it turned out that the ex-senator and banker in the past was a state security officer, served for a third of a century and retired with the rank of lieutenant colonel.

The bank was taken over by the Deposit Insurance Agency (DIA). It is trying to return the property and assets transferred by Bazhanov's team to third-party organizations under the wing of the IBSP. We can talk about 9 billion rubles that have left the account of a financial organization. In a series of such steps, a criminal case against Sergei Bazhanov just arose. Moreover, it was even possible to initiate it only from the fifth time, and the formal charge was brought only a year after that.

The DIA is gradually paying off the bank's clients through the sale of Bazhanov's assets, including a mansion on Kamenny Island and a Bentley car. Recently, the agency demanded that CJSC Radio Company Kultura, which owns Radio Hermitage, associated with the Bazhanov family, be declared bankrupt.

Source: Fontanka.ru

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Written by Spec007

Published: 07 June 2021

Employees of the Main Investigation Department of the Ministry of Internal Affairs of St. Petersburg and the Leningrad Region on the morning of May 26 conducted searches at nine addresses at once, including the apartment of the family of Sergei Bazhanov, the former head of the "International Bank of St. Petersburg".

According to Fontanka, we are talking about a new criminal case, which was initiated under Article 159, Part 4 (fraud on a particularly large scale), after the statement of representatives of the Deposit Insurance Agency.

Earlier, another case was initiated against Sergey Bazhanov, who now lives permanently abroad, under the milder, article 172.1, Part 2 — "Falsification of financial documents". The editors know that in the framework of this case, Bazhanov has already been arrested in absentia and put on the international wanted list. His whereabouts are not particularly hidden, but he lives in a country that does not extradite suspects of economic crimes to Russia.

Sergey Bazhanov headed the International Bank of St. Petersburg until 2018, when the Central Bank transferred the functions of its interim administration to the Deposit Insurance Agency. The regulator justified its decision on the "unstable financial situation" of the financial institution and " a threat to the interests of its creditors and depositors."

Since then, the temporary managers have been trying to return the property and assets transferred by Sergey Bazhanov's team to third-party organizations under the bank's wing. We are talking about 9 billion rubles which were taken from the accounts of the IBSPB. In a series of such steps and actions, a criminal case against Sergei Bazhanov has just been opened. This was possible only on the fifth attempt, and the formal charge was brought only a year later after that.

Source Фонтанка.ру Деловой Петербург

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Written by Юля

Published: 27 August 2020

Ex-senator and owner of the International Bank of St. Petersburg Sergey Bazhanov is trying to ban the press and the Internet from calling him a lieutenant colonel of the FSB.

In the fall of 2018, the licence of the IBSP bank owned by Bazhanov was revoked by the Central Bank of the Russian Federation, and then, later, the bank itself, at the request of the same Central Bank of the Russian Federation, was declared bankrupt by the Arbitration Court of St. Petersburg and the Leningrad Region.

About a year ago, St. Petersburg online publications Фонтанка.ру and 47news.ru published the unexpected information that Sergey Bazhanov is a lieutenant colonel of the FSB. These publications published as proof a photo of his military ID card, which shows that Bazhanov received his first rank in the then KGB of the USSR in 1987. The same photos show that Bazhanov received the last rank of Lieutenant Colonel of the FSB in 2003, being the owner of the IBSP.

In the future, judging by press publications, Bazhanov has left Russia and is now abroad, hiding from a criminal case initiated by the Investigative Department of the Investigative Committee of the Russian Federation for the North-Western Federal District in connection with the discovery by the Central Bank of the Russian Federation of a "hole" in the capital of IBSP in the amount of 13 billion rubles, as well as signs of the withdrawal of the bank's assets abroad.

Now, a year after the publications, Bazhanov decided to get rid of the" toxic "prefix" Lieutenant Colonel of the FSB " abroad and appealed to the Smolninsky District Court of St. Petersburg with three statements, where the interested parties are indicated:

• - the owner of the Internet resource Pikabu-M. S. Khryashchev (CASE No. 9-4400 / 2020 ~ M-3033/2020);
• - Yandex LLC (CASE NO. 9-4456 / 2020 ~ M-3034/2020);
• - Department of Roskomnadzor for the North-Western Federal District (CASE NO. 2-4461 / 2020 ~ M-2876/2020).

The first application was dismissed by the court, the second was returned to the applicant, and the third was finally accepted and scheduled for a hearing in September 2020.

Everything is fine in these cases! The fact that a banker with 30 years of experience in banking and an ex-senator was only able to submit an application for the third time, which was accepted by the court. The fact that the rank of lieutenant colonel of the FSB in the circumstances under consideration ceased to be a matter of pride for Bazhanov, and began to interfere with life abroad so much that it forced him to start lawsuits with Yandex and others! And of course, it is surprising that Bazhanov has never heard of the Barbara Streisand effect, which makes it impossible to conceal any information in the network and the press, since attempts to ban it tend to increase its spread.

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Written by Юля

Published: 22 October 2019

Bazhanova Tatyana Vasilyevna

SPOILER: LET IT GO TO THE WIND. NOT ALL OF THEM, THOUGH. DON'T WORRY, THE BANKERS ARE FINE.

1.Dolce vita

In the rainy summer of 2018, the International Bank of St. Petersburg, owned by former senator and retired State Security Colonel, began to have problems. More precisely, the problems, of course, began much earlier, but it was then that they were talked about aloud. And, despite the fact that the bankers tirelessly kept a straight face, handing out interviews and throwing dust in eyes at elite receptions, the dolce vita suddenly ended.

In the photo: A regular of social parties Bazhanova Tatyana Vasilyevna (left).  photo credit: sabaka.ru

In the autumn, the Bank of Russia introduces a moratorium on meeting creditors ' claims and appoints a temporary administration to manage the bank. And on October 31, IBSP had its license revoked.

Then, as usual, the painstaking work of the interim administration to assess the scale of the disaster. The question is not idle, because 18 billion rubles of "physicists" and 22 billion rubles of legal entities, and even some - LSR, Settle group, KVS, are hanging on the accounts in the IBSP... The verdict is not comforting - the negative difference between the bank's assets and liabilities (to common people – a "hole" in the capital) is an impressive 13 billion rubles. Moreover, as luck would have it, the interim administration explicitly stated that some of the assets were taken offshore. A little later, the restless journalists of the publication " Fontanka" will find out that 9 billion rubles under fake contracts were transferred to the accounts of the Cyprus firm Hervet Investments, issued to Alexander Zuev-the brother of Tatyana Bazhanova. It would seem that "congratulations, the crime is solved", as the famous St. Petersburg bearded man used to say, but no. Although the entire pile of skeletons from the bank's cabinets was immediately sent to law enforcement agencies, the response was silence. According to the same "Fontanka", the investigator of the Main Investigative Department of the Ministry of Internal Affairs of St. Petersburg four times (!) made an approach to the initiation of a criminal case and four times came across a polite refusal of the Prosecutor's Office of St. Petersburg. After watching this depressing action for some time, the ex-senator, ex-Chekist and now ex-banker Bazhanov flew away from sin to London, to be sad about the fate of Russia. Fortunately, in order to make it better to be sad in a foreign country, he paid himself, his wife and his henchmen in advance "golden parachutes" of 84 million rubles and dividends in the amount of as much as 60 million rubles from the only working business – a battered business center on the Vyborg side, which he immediately sold. As a nice addition to the coveted 9 billion.