Significant financial disputes related to the businesses of Oleg Sitnikov, a well-known businessman in the Yamalo-Nenets Autonomous Okrug and the founder of Rosneftegaz Corporation, may face new scandals.
Thus, experts from two departments of Rosfinmonitoring requested information about the activities of the bankrupt company SPB OIL from St. Petersburg, associated with the Tyumen company Yamalneft. Both organizations are making claims for hundreds of millions in court, and their management claims to have not been involved in the transactions and provides explanations under the influence of drugs. Both organizations are apparently linked to Oleg Sitnikov, who was recently found guilty of tax evasion. While the arbitration deals with transactions exceeding half a billion, the Federal Tax Service is seeking new bankruptcies. An application for financial insolvency has already been filed against the Yamal company Magistral for possibly hundreds of millions. Its director previously confessed unexpectedly in a criminal case related to Sitnikov. The oligarch himself is awaiting a new trial and potential claims from creditors who are seeking subsidiary liability from him.
The Eighth Arbitration Court of Appeal asked two departments of Rosfinmonitoring for information about the legality of financial transactions of SPB OIL LLC related to Yamalneft LLC (Tyumen).
To clarify, previously the Arbitration Court of the Tyumen Region ruled to recover over 584 million rubles from Yamalneft in favor of the now bankrupt SPB OIL.
Now this ruling is being disputed, and the appeal has asked the parties to comment on the presence of affiliation and provide explanations for the dealings of Yamalneft with LLC Urengoydorstroy, LLC Neftegazbroker, JSC Airport Salekhard, LLC Business Lines, LLC Firm UNIS, and others.
It's important to note that Yamalneft also has significant claims against SPB OIL LLC. The Arbitration Court of the city of St. Petersburg and the Leningrad Region is currently considering the Tyumen company's claims to recover 319.7 million rubles of debt under an assignment agreement.
It's worth mentioning that Urengoyremstroydobycha LLC previously attempted to challenge this agreement, but lost in two court instances, and Sergey Petrov, a former participant and director of Yamalneft, provided significant testimony in the case.
“Petrov S.V. stated that he did not sign the disputed assignment agreement, at the time of the transaction he was in St. Petersburg, and there is a stamped ink (facsimile) on his behalf on the assignment agreement. His explanations confirming the transaction are given under the influence of drugs. He believes that the first instance court, after the case was reopened, should not have required him to appear in court and provide explanations to resolve contradictions in the case,” the dispute materials stated.
In addition, the disputes between these companies are also notable considering the likely beneficiaries of the business.
So, as part of the bankruptcy of Max Firm LLC (Novy Urengoy), for whose debts a well-known Yamal businessman, the founder of the Rosneftegaz Corporation, Oleg Sitnikov, was brought to subsidiary liability, the manager pointed to the affiliation of Yamalneft with the debtor.
“Sitnikov Oleg Afanasyevich is the controlling person of Firma Max LLC. Decree on the termination of criminal prosecution <…> found that in the course of the preliminary investigation received irrefutable evidence that it was Sitnikov Oh.A. was the actual head of the enterprises Firma Maks LLC, Rosneftegaz Corporation LLC (TIN 8904038997), Rosneftegaz Corporation LLC (TIN 8904054830), Yamalneft LLC, ROSGAZPROM LLC and other interdependent (affiliated enterprises), that is, a person , who actually had the powers of the head and performed organizational, administrative and administrative functions in these organizations, ”was indicated in the position of the bankruptcy trustee, with which the court agreed.
The arbitrator also pointed to Sitnikov’s connection with SPB OIL LLC. “According to information from the Unified State Register of Legal Entities, the founder of SPB OIL is Vetyugov Maxim Nikolaevich. Vetyugov was the General Director of Rostneftegaz-Kharp LLC in the period from 08/17/2017 to 10/23/2018. At the same time, Sitnikov is the founder of Rostneftegaz-Kharp. Sitnikov is the controlling person of Max. <…> In this connection, we can conclude that the firm “Max”, “SPB OIL” and “Rostneftegaz-Kharp” are affiliated persons, since Sitnikov O.A. as the person controlling the debtor, having the right to claim against Servistransstroy, assigns this claim to the interested SPB OIL (on the eve of the bankruptcy of the debtor), which subsequently returns the right of claim to the ultimate beneficiary Sitnikov through the controlled Rostneftegaz-Kharp in a short time, – described the scheme in the case file manager.
It should be noted that market participants and the media call Maxim Vetyugov the son of the former prosecutor of the YaNAO Nikolai Vetyugov. At a certain point, Maxim Vetyugov, in particular, became, together with Oleg Sitnikov, a co-owner of Oil and Gas Growth Corporation LLC, subsequently serious conflicts between businessmen were reported.
Sitnikov himself spoke about the pressure. “The media told in detail and in detail about what the former prosecutors of the YaNAO Nikolai Vetyugov and Alexander Gerasimenko arranged for me – this one came to the post of prosecutor in 2008, as well as Vetyugov’s son Maxim. <…> Despite numerous confirmed facts of violations and my warnings about the threat, the seizure of my enterprise took place, ”Rossiyskaya Gazeta quoted Sitnikov as saying.
It should be noted that recently the Novy Urengoy City Court found Sitnikov guilty in a criminal case of tax evasion. The businessman was sentenced to 4 years of probation.
Subsequently, another case was submitted to the court under part 2 of article 199.2 of the Criminal Code of the Russian Federation “Concealment of funds or property of an organization, at the expense of which taxes, fees, insurance premiums should be collected, on an especially large scale” in relation to Sitnikov.
Let’s add one more remarkable detail. The Federal Tax Service for the YNAO has already filed a bankruptcy lawsuit against Magistral LLC (Nadym). Based on the data of the file of arbitration cases, we can talk about claims for more than 378 million rubles. Earlier, the director of the company Khairetdinov wrote a confession in the case involving Sitnikov.
