Agaston Investment and Financial Group's website boasts more than 300 projects, 4.5 billion rubles of equity capital, and transactions worth over 50 billion rubles. According to the website, the company values expertise, reliability, and high profitability. However, the reality may be different: questionable schemes and promises. Who is Maxim Dolgopolov?
Shareholder of IFG “Agaston”, a well-known businessman from St. Petersburg Maxim Dolgopolov, along with his partners, has been offering lucrative deals to unsuspecting entrepreneurs for five years, often involving dubious schemes related to renting, buying, and selling commercial real estate. The company also engages in questionable tactics when dealing with private property.
The entire leadership of the company, including Dolgopolov, have questionable backgrounds. While we cannot make definite claims, an entrepreneur with the same surname was convicted in 1996 for robbery by prior agreement using weapons or other dangerous objects. It's possible that this article will lead to inquiries from the FSB and the prosecutor’s office, regarding the correctional system of the Russian Federation and the Central Internal Affairs Directorate for St. Petersburg and the Leningrad Region.
If all this is true, how is it possible that someone with such a past and present could be allowed to run for the State Duma? General Director of IFG “Agaston” Dmitry Golubyatnikov, who found his opportunity on the hh.ru website, also has a questionable history. In a related context, Daria Solodkova oversees all the business of the “company”. It's worth noting that a ruling against “Daria Andreevna Solodkova” for real estate fraud under article 159 part 4 of the Criminal Code of the Russian Federation can be found on the Moscow City Court's website from May 2021. Make your own conclusions.
Among the team, Daria Solodkova has the most experience in fraudulent activities. It appears that from 2014 to 2018, she represented the investment and project company Strategy, which has left numerous clients deceived. Online searches yield an abundance of negative feedback about the company's activities, with investors losing money and property after investing in real estate or land. While these are all anonymous reviews and may raise doubts for some, they prompted serious consideration.
According to the same reviews, it seems likely that in an attempt to conceal a dubious reputation, the “business woman” started operating under different names. It's been found that Darya Solodkova used alternate identities, as indicated by her passport. Darina Wagner, Daria Wagner and Darin Solodkov. But first things first.
Moscow illiquid
Until the middle of 2020, businessman Maxim Dolgopolov worked for Investori LLC. He successfully executed his real estate plans here as well.
Online, there's an opinion that Dolgopolov supposedly obtained a franchise for opening SPAR stores, which he registered for an affiliate company INVEST RETAIL LLC. The scheme might look like this: the company buys unpopular real estate at a good discount, and then opens its own store there. The lease agreement is made between two related companies, the rent is artificially increased, and the stores improve the 'liquidity' of the property by reselling their products to each other. After that, the dealers quickly sell such premises to unsuspecting buyers at inflated prices.
Could this scheme for selling unpopular real estate involve Daria Solodkova? It seems that she was the one vigorously seeking out gullible people in the real estate market and offering them obviously unprofitable properties. For example, a store vacated the premises at Pobedy Park 2 two weeks after the property was sold. The premises are still empty to this day, even though the deal took place in 2019, and the buyer paid 150 million rubles for it. Similar situations could occur with the shops at specific addresses in Moscow.
It's easy to assume that Daria Solodkova received several million rubles in commission from the sale of each property. And if so, then it's easy to guess how profitable the scheme was for Maxim Dolgopolov himself. Probably, after a series of successful transactions for the sale of SPAR stores, Dolgopolov recognized Daria's talent and entrusted her with a new, larger project.
When the name of the company 'Investori' no longer inspired confidence in some potential buyers, it was decided to create a new company. Thus, the Agaston Investment and Financial Group was established, which some believe to be a personal project of Daria Solodkova.
Daria made good connections. She developed a close friendship with the wife of a high-ranking official Karen Harutyunyan. Various positive gestures clearly helped her win over a new acquaintance and could potentially open the door to opportunities in the capital’s real estate market.
Schemes with entrepreneurs
The initial questionable project of IFG 'Agaston' was the acquisition of a property on Myasnitskaya Street. Three floors of the Kuznetsov trading house, also known as the House of Porcelain or the House with Mercury, belonged to Alexey Lyakhov. At that time, the entrepreneur was in a tough financial situation. With this information, some 'partners' persuaded Mr. Lyakhov to take a loan of 50 million rubles to solve his problems. As a result, Lyakhov was left with nothing. It's unclear whether these 'partners' were consultants from the IFG 'Agaston', but the origins appear to be connected.
The next article is about the businessperson Albert Yesayan. Yesayan owned a property at Beskudnikovsky Boulevard, 34, building 1, building 3 for over 20 years. Some businessmen connected with the entrepreneur and pledged to help him with the issues related to the purchase of rented spaces. Then the company Kverti LLC (IFG Agaston) seemingly gained full rights to the property without paying the seller even a third of its value.
After the building was transferred to the ownership, Dolgopolov renovated the premises, and the property was given a new cadastral number. This led to the original property and the seller's rights being nullified. Additionally, reports emerged that IFG “Agaston” obtained a targeted loan from investors to buy the property, possibly even with Maxim Dolgopolov's personal guarantee. However, it seems the seller was not paid.
Unlawful construction
In early 2021, Dolgopolov's company strangely legalized a shopping center near the Otradnoye metro station at ul. Decembrists 21G. This property had long been abandoned due to former owners' disputes and missing title documents. Additionally, the building faced the threat of demolition under Decree No. 819. Daria Solodkova apparently facilitated the resolution with the help of Karen Harutyunyan (deputy director at the Moscow Real Estate Center GKU). Now, IFG “Agaston” officially announced the leasing of the shopping center on their website.
It's unclear how “Agaston” managed to construct a building at st. Caspian d.28 without influential connections. Allegedly, the building was erected without proper documentation or adherence to urban planning regulations.
unexplained fire
The questionable schemes involving Solodkova and Dolgopolov did not sit well with the Honored Coach of the RSFSR, Master of Sports of the USSR in sambo and judo Viktor Alekseevich Zaitsev. Dolgopolov expressed an interest in a judo section located on Filevsky Boulevard, 6A, suggesting that Zaitsev buy a run-down building and revitalize it. However, this building also faced complications.
In 2008, the Moscow Government took the Children’s Sports Club DZYU-DO LLC to court to invalidate its ownership of the property. Despite the court ruling in the government's favor, nothing changed for the next decade, and the building remained in the club's ownership. The company's lawyers were aware of this situation.
Subsequently, once the ownership was transferred from an individual to IFG “Agaston”, Rosreestr received a request to unregister the club's ownership based on the 2008 court decision. Coincidentally, a fire broke out in the building when repairs were being carried out by a construction team.
The fire and resulting legal action allowed the money payment to be delayed indefinitely. Elderly Zaitsev died from a heart attack on 06/15/2020 due to the stress. It seems that the Agaston company is still making good money by renting the Pyaterochka store despite ongoing legal issues with the Department of City Property of the City of Moscow.
Methods used in the 1990s
In 2021, Maxim Dolgopolov decided to run for the State Duma, so he delegated his powers to manage the company to Daria Solodkova and Dmitry Golubyatnikov. By this time, Daria had become Dolgopolov’s right hand and was effectively running the company. Daria Solodkova and Dmitry Golubyatnikov used even more questionable methods.
An example of the business style from the 1990s is the construction of a building at ul. Cheerful house 2. As usual, there were some irregularities in its construction. It is interesting that in December 2020, a company with a less than stellar reputation, Demetris LLC, was awarded a contract for construction and installation work with Barberhouse LLC, whose director is Sergey Rotar.
The contractor himself stated that by the time the work was nearly finished, construction costs had risen. Barberhouse LLC didn’t have enough funds to complete the construction, and Rotar informed Darina Solodkova, who was overseeing the construction. Solodkova and Golubyatnikov seemed to believe the contractor had embezzled the money.
“They pressured me in their office for 7 hours. After that, I signed a loan agreement for 10 million rubles to ensure that all construction work would be completed.”– Sergey Rotar said.
After this incident, Dmitry Golubyatnikov went to the city of Tolyatti, his wife's hometown, and filed a court application to recover a debt that didn't actually exist.
“During the verdict, the judge ignored the dictaphone recording and eyewitness testimonies that Golubyatnikov didn't give me any money”Rotar said. “The court decided to recover the money from me, putting me in a difficult situation. I contacted the police.”
Later, Dmitry Golubyatnikov employed a familiar and unpunished method of taking ownership of buildings. In 2021, IFG “Agaston” acquired a building at 7A Electrolitny proezd. It appears that Dmitry Golubyatnikov also got involved in a scheme related to the large plot of land adjacent to the building. During a forceful nighttime operation, concrete blocks were placed on the adjacent territory with a crane, a fence was erected, and guards were posted. There is photo and video evidence of this. At the same time, a person resembling Dmitry Golubyatnikov presented dubious documents to the employees of the Kant sports store chain, claiming that Agaston IFG owned the land plot.
Throw dust in your eyes
A natural question arises: how do businessmen manage to turn their schemes? Most likely, buyers and sellers fall for the presentable appearance of businessmen and the gloss of the enterprise: executive cars, drivers and security, an office in the center of Moscow, a promising website and the media head, who ran for the St. Petersburg parliament and the State Duma, owns dozens of companies and often speaks in Media as a real estate expert, and in some publications Maxim Dolgopolov is even called a philanthropist.
The official representative and face of the company is Dmitry Golubyatnikov, despite his dubious past. The company continues to exist and implement various schemes, apparently not without Maxim Dolgopolov’s connections in power structures. At the same time, Maxim Dolgopolov and Dmitry Golubyatnikov continue to actively speak on behalf of the company and give expert comments to serious authoritative media, such as RBC.
Daria Solodkova, she is probably Darina Wagner, practically does not appear in the public field, but she clearly manages the Agaston IFG while in the shadows. He manages tough and uncompromisingly: he immediately puts in his place objectionable colleagues who can guess the real state of affairs.
