The Prosecutor General's Office of Switzerland received a statement in which it is required to start an investigation against the oligarch Alisher Usmanov, who is close to the Kremlin, and to block all the money in the accounts of Metalloinvest Trading AG. The applicants are 14 former minority shareholders of Lebedinsky GOK (the list is at the disposal of the Rucriminal.info editorial office). They say that they lost their shares in the course of a forced redemption, which was made by Usmanov's structures at prices far from market ones. The assessment was carried out by Gorislavtsev & Co. Appraisal ", which proceeded from the fact that the official revenue of the GOK was less than $ 1 billion. However, according to the applicants, in reality the proceeds were at least three times lower. For tax optimization purposes, the products were sold at reduced prices to Usmanov's offshore companies (BGMT and FMC ltd.), And they were already selling them at market prices. As a result, the mine's real revenue was at least $ 3 billion.
“When we conveyed our modest request for fair play to Alisher Usmanov and provided him with documents confirming the concentration of LGOK's export profits in his own offshore companies (BGMT and FMC ltd.), We immediately received the promise of a prompt and fair settlement of the dispute .. He lied!” , - indicate the former shareholders in a statement to the Prosecutor General's Office of Switzerland. - Many companies, despite dubious decisions confirming the legality of the buyout, have since voluntarily decided to pay compensation to former minority shareholders. Alas! Not in the case of Mr. Alisher USMANOV. "
The ex-shareholders indicate that they turned to the General Prosecutor's Office of Switzerland, since Usmanov permanently resides in the territory of this country.
“We humbly ask for your support and help in Europe, where we intend to prove an obvious fact (with the attached documents): an honorary citizen of Russia, Uzbekistan, Great Britain and Switzerland in one person, a generous patron of art and English football, forgot about his recent past and, using absolute immunity in Russia, under the guise of his own funds, earns himself the image of a generous philanthropist, in reality spending our funds ... Since Mr. USMANOV is trying to withdraw all his assets from the EU or hide "his" property at the expense of his friend Mr. Farhad Moshiri, in order to avoid arrest as a result of sanctions, we kindly ask you to apply prosecutorial response measures and freeze the amounts on the accounts of Metalloinvest Trading AG, taking into account the value of our shares, until the court ruling. ”
Rucriminal.info publishes a translation of the shareholders' statement.
"Ladies and gentlemen!
We, the miners of Lebedinsky GOK, understand that your area of interest is the fight against fraud and money laundering in the EU.
Please note: the subject of our application is permanently located in Switzerland and London, its firms engaged in money laundering and financing secret operations on behalf of corrupt Russian officials are also in your jurisdiction.
We are confident that we can provide you with significant assistance in preventing new fraudulent transactions in Europe.
Here we briefly describe our violation of property rights:
1. On October 10, 2007, the registrar LLC NP “Rekom” wrote off the securities from the custody accounts of minority shareholders of the Open Joint Stock Company “Lebedinsky GOK” (LGOK). The basis for this transaction was the requirement of October 10, 2007, according to which the majority shareholder of LGOK, OJSC Gazmetall (renamed METALLOINVEST), paid 8,015.19 rubles. (Equivalent to US $ 320) per common share and assumed to be the fair market price.
Thus, Metalloinvest exercised its rights to compulsory redemption of minority shareholders in accordance with the provisions of the Russian law “On Joint Stock Companies”, which Alisher USMANOV lobbied for amendments to the law in 2006.
We have overwhelming evidence that the proceedings were flawed, both in process and in results.
In addition to many documents, we received 4 confirmations of the deliberately understated value of our private property from 4 top managers close to Mr. USMANOV!
LGOK is now owned by Metalloinvest Management Company LLC (Metalloinvest).
2. In accordance with the provisions of Federal Law No. 208-FZ “On Joint Stock Companies”, the majority shareholder of OOO GAZMETALL (“METALLOINVEST”) transferred funds to a notary's account by forced redemption of shares. based on the established fair value of RUB 8,015.19 (USD 320) per ordinary share, corresponding to the market value.
Clause 4 of Article 84.8 of the Federal Law No. 208-FZ: Securities are redeemed at a price not lower than the market value of the redeemed securities, which must be determined by an appraiser.
According to the order of Metalloinvest / GAZMETALL, the market price of our shares was determined by Gorislavtsev & Co. Assessment ".
The assessment of Gorislavtsev & Co was the foundation It is completely erroneous and substantively inaccurate in assessing the true fair market price, which should be attributed to the blocks of shares of minority shareholders. All production facilities were valued almost at the scrap price. In addition, it was prepared on the basis of clearly limited and materially incorrect data, which completely ignored the transfer pricing schemes used by Metalloinvest and its affiliates in relation to the sale of iron ore products.
3. When we conveyed our modest request for fair play to Alisher Usmanov and provided him with documents confirming the concentration of LGOK's export profits in his own offshore companies (BGMT and FMC ltd.), We immediately received the promise of a prompt and fair settlement of the dispute .. He lied!
At the same time, as it turned out, work was underway to assess the risks associated with the criminal aspects of large-scale tax evasion at our request. The comparison speaks for itself: while Usmanov's offshore companies are selling our iron ore (FMC Group) for more than $ 3 billion a year using a "transfer pricing" scheme, our official revenue was less than $ 1 billion in a year of divestment of our shares. Alisher Usmanov.
4. Between 2008 and 2011, 15 minority shareholders of LGOK filed lawsuits in various Russian courts and state authorities regarding the buyout process and how the “fair market price” was established in the valuation report prepared by Gorislavtsev and Co. ("Gorislavtsev and Co Attestation").
In short, we were deceived by a lawyer who was completely controlled by Usmanov's company. Some time later, METALLOINVEST's dummy lawyer was incapacitated in a car accident, and Alisher's company developed a scheme with a full set of official responses from the Russian authorities at all levels, the essence of which is to completely cover up Putin's secret adviser.
5. Since 2011, we have been conducting a comprehensive investigation of the legal and factual circumstances of the 2007 buyout. As part of this process, we commissioned two completely independent appraisal reports prepared by Khanzhonkov, the Institute of Private Experts, the Belgorod Regional Forensic Center and the Expert Council of the Interregional Union of Appraisers, Rostov. These independent estimates confirm that the price paid for the shares should have been significantly higher, in fact about 3 times higher than the price paid; The fair market price for the shares at the official date of repurchase was RR 23,477.66 (equivalent to USD 939) per share.
6. In 2014, we obtained information from the documents submitted by Metalloinvest to the London Stock Exchange and from the prospectus “Money Supply from Ferrous Metal Company Limited to Europe Steel Plc” (the “Money Supply”). These two reports and the Cash Offer demonstrate to any independent observer that Metalloinvest and its affiliates used aggressive tax evasion strategies based on well-known and discredited transfer pricing schemes. Such schemes have been the subject of criticism by Russian courts in the highly publicized tax and corporate case of the oil company Yukos (see also Khodorkovsky v. Russia (no. 2) (11082/06) (2014) 59 EHRR 7; Lebedev v. Russia (13772/05) (2014) 59 EHRR 7; OAO Oil Company Yukos v. Russia (14902/04) (2012) 54 EHRR 19)).
7. We then reviewed and analyzed in detail the investigation published by Alexey Navalny; We kindly ask you to read the details of this investigation at https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sM8_EvVD4iw. The investigation clarifies that Metalloinvest used highly questionable transfer pricing trading schemes for the sale of iron ore. This is strong evidence that the value of LGOK was significantly undervalued prior to the buyout.
Thus, in addition to the fact that GAZMETALL gained control over the largest iron ore producer in Europe, JSC Lebedinsky GOK (LebGOK) through green mail (the issue of gas supply) with the help of Dmitry Medvedev (as chairman of the board of GAZPROM and friend of A. Usmanov in one person) was grossly and cynically violated the key principle of forced redemption - “the market price of an asset”.
8. It is well known that in the early 2000s, there were massive abuses of minority shareholders' rights in the course of compulsory share buybacks and consolidation of large Russian holding companies. However, you know that many companies, despite questionable decisions confirming the legality of the buyout, have since voluntarily decided to pay compensation to former minority shareholders. Alas! Not in the case of Mr. Alisher USMANOV.
9. Taking into account the above issues, we, as minority shareholders of LGOK, seek legal assistance in the UK and the EU from Metalloinvest and controlling and affiliated persons and individuals (in particular, those who currently reside in the jurisdictions of the United Kingdom and Switzerland).
In fact, due to the enormous social distance that Mr. Usmanov has established between himself and us, for minority shareholders who have spent most of their lives making our Lebedinsky mine a super-profitable enterprise, this is not the preferred, but the only course of action.
We pass on a small but quite obvious part of the documents to you as the Attorney General of Switzerland. We humbly ask for your support and help in Europe, where we intend to prove an obvious fact (with the attached documents): an honorary citizen of Russia, Uzbekistan, Great Britain and Switzerland in one person, a generous patron of art and English football, forgot about his recent past and, using the absolute immunity in Russia, under the guise of their own funds, earn themselves the image of a generous patron of the arts, in reality spending our funds.
We are ready to bring all the documents and send our German and English speaking representative in the EU to your office within 24 hours.
Since Mr. USMANOV is trying to withdraw all of his assets from the EU or hide "his" property at the expense of his friend Mr. Farhad Moshiri in order to avoid arrest as a result of sanctions, we kindly ask you to apply prosecutorial response measures and block the amounts on Metalloinvest Trading accounts AG, given the value of our shares, pending a court decision.
Of course, you can help us restore grossly violated private property rights that we lost as a result of the misconduct of a citizen with multiple passports in Europe. We undertake to bring to you and the courts of Europe all information about the activities of the patron. "
Thomas Gordon
To be continued
