Everyone in our country knows that Gazprom is a national treasure of Russia. However, few people know how this very asset turns into the personal well-being of citizens and organizations “friendly” to the employees of the state-owned company - mainly those who are familiar with the “backstage kitchen” of this energy giant. Big money, as you know, loves silence, so everything happens silently for the gas monopolist. In the previous article, our publication and his wife - this couple put the distribution of the gas giant's largest contracts on stream.

They practically never have leaks, but our editorial staff came across interesting documents from one of Gazprom’s large subsidiaries - LLC Gazprom Mezhregiongaz responsible for domestic gas sales Russian market. It follows from them that past the attentive gaze of the graduate Russian Academy civil service under the President of the Russian Federation, Deputy General Director for Economics and Finance Natalya Konovalenko, the “weaning” scheme has been implemented for many years Money at gas distribution organizations Gazprom".

Activities of the following legal entities, in my opinion, when Konovalenko N. P., who occupies not the last position at OJSC Gazprom Mezhregiongaz and oversees government procurement, causes significant harm to the entire Gazprom, and with it Russian Federation, suffering from shortfalls in taxes and the withdrawal of funds to offshore companies - we are talking about “losses” of hundreds of millions of rubles annually. At the same time, the management of the Gazprom concern, represented by Alexey Miller, probably doesn’t even suspect what’s going on in the next office.

A monopoly must be a monopoly

The Gazprom Mezhregiongaz Group provides gas supplies to consumers through 48 subsidiaries for gas sales. The huge colossus, which employs 160 thousand people, supplies “blue fuel” to the vast majority of the country’s population and a significant part of industry.

Of course, all this must have appropriate material support - such a huge structure constantly requires goods, work and various services. It was these needs that became the basis for large private businesses under Ms. Konovalenko, who took office in 2007.

It was during this period, perhaps with the best intentions - to make a profit for the benefit of the Gazprom Mezhregiongaz company - that a scheme for purchasing goods and services through an electronic platform was introduced, which, as it later turned out, contained a huge potential for corruption and abuse, and at all its stages, starting with the admission of superficially verified firms to tenders and ending with inattentively monitored prices for goods and services.

Until 2012 role electronic platform, where the tenders were held, was performed by the company ANT-Inform LLC, co-founded by Anzhelika Prilepina. However, in 2012, the little-known company Gazenergoinform became a strategic partner of Gazprom Mezhregiongaz - it was appointed as the organizer of all competitive procedures for Gazprom companies. The company was headed by the same Prilepina.

As a result, Gazenergoinform overnight became a competitive agent for 212 Gazprom companies. From each contract concluded by these enterprises, Gazenergoinform receives 1.77% until 2016. Subsequently, the list was expanded to 226 Gazprom companies.

In theory, all willing suppliers submit applications for the tender, Gazprom must choose the best price-quality ratio and make the purchase. This is how competition, economy and efficiency are achieved - all together or separately. However, in reality, it turns out that among the winners you can often see the same companies: ANT-Inform LLC, Gazstroy North-West LLC, Project Technology LLC, and Arma LLC.

Raven to crow

Against this background, it is unlikely that anyone will be surprised by the fact that all the above-mentioned companies, according to open sources, are closely affiliated with each other. For example, the organizer of tenders “Gazenergoinform” is the owner of 74% of the electronic platform “GazNeftetorg.ru”, where it places its tenders.

The company ANT-Inform is participating in the announced auction, which until 2012 owned 70% of Gazenergoinform and 49% of GazNeftetorg.ru. Along with it there is a “competitor” - Gazstroy North-West, among the founders of which... is the same ANT-Inform.

The connection between the remaining two companies participating in the tenders also exists: CEO"Army" Alexandra Bumaga is a co-founder of Project Technology.

But the connection between “Arma” and “ANT-Inform” does not lie on the surface, and its presence can be assumed based on family ties. Thus, the founder of “Arma” is a certain Tatyana Svitova from St. Petersburg. By a strange coincidence, a certain Natalya Svitova (probably the sister of Tatyana Svitova) is a co-founder of Audit-NT LLC. As they say, the circle is closed?

What does this mean: the same people or organizations participate in the announcement of the tender, in its conduct and choose the winners? At the same time, the total amount of contracts for 2013 between the structures of Gazprom Mezhregiongaz and these companies exceeded 1.1 billion rubles, and for the first half of 2014 amounted to more than 332 million rubles. If you only believe in the experts’ assumptions regarding the 30% increase in prices for goods and services, this group of individuals and legal entities received more than 400 million “net” rubles from Gazprom in just this year and a half.

In all these cash flows one can find in one form or another the participation of ANT-Inform LLC, which has been headed by Tatyana Savostenok for many years, as well as her colleagues at the St. Petersburg LLC Layered Plastics Plant - Dmitry Zaitsev, Angelika Prilepina and others.

In the photo: Top Manager of Gazprom Mezhregiongaz LLC N. P. Konovalenko

Offshore transfer?

For a long time, ANT-Inform was one of 300 companies owned by Gazprom Mezhregiongaz. However, in 2009, something both ordinary and surprising happened to one of the gas giant’s key suppliers: the company changed its owner.

The change, however, was formal - Audit-NT LLC sold the company to Teploinvest OJSC. All companies, one way or another, were controlled by Gazprom Mezhregiongaz, and therefore the deal could hardly attract attention. If not for one nuance: the selling price. Teploinvest bought one of the largest suppliers of the corporation, which supplies gas to the whole of Russia, for only 13 thousand rubles.

However, then no one really paid attention to this - in the end, the real owner remained the state, and it makes no difference whether it bought the company from itself for 13 thousand rubles, for 13 million or for 1 ruble.

Two years have passed, and ANT-Inform is being sold again, but this time “control” is already leaving the state for Cypriot offshore companies and private individuals. And again, the sale price, as it became known from semi-open sources, is... 13 thousand rubles.

It’s hard to believe, but it turns out that Gazprom sold one of its key suppliers for a symbolic sum in February 2011? The sale price was at least a thousand times less than expected: ANT-Inform’s net profit in 2010 was 397.1 million rubles, with revenue of 3.45 billion rubles. Net assets the company reached 684 million rubles by January 1, 2011. Based on these figures, as well as the competitions won on the informatization strategy of OJSC Gazprom, the value of the company should have been about 3 billion rubles, but instead it was sold at “internal” prices?

Who became the happy owner of an asset that passes Gazprom's billions through their accounts? 25% each went to two Cypriot offshore companies - Volneno Holdings Ltd and Delonaria Holdings Ltd, as well as St. Petersburg-based GEP Development. Another 24% was bought by a certain Dmitry Zaitsev, the namesake of the already familiar chairman of the board of directors of the St. Petersburg-based LLC Laminated Plastics Plant.

Privatize profits

The timing of the sale of ANT-Inform shares to offshore companies was not at all accidental. Until 2011, Gazprom distributed the main tenders, and the company participated in them as an internal, “its” supplier. When most of the necessary competitions were won and the turn came to make a profit from multimillion-dollar contracts with Gazprom, the company was “taken offshore”, apparently in order to hide real income from Russian tax authorities, and, probably, to support the budget of the Republic of Cyprus.

By the end of 2012, the situation with ANT-Inform shareholders changed again - they became entirely individuals. Dmitry Zaitsev increased his share to 25%, Natalya Svitova, Mikhail Botvinkin and Natalia Tikhonchuk each received 20%, and Daria Sergeeva controlled 10%. Thus, the list was changed to “physicists” at the moment when the state announced a campaign to combat offshore schemes and companies in government procurement. Moreover, the same persons remained among the owners. For example, Mr. Botvinkin is the founder and director of the already familiar GEP Development, which owned a stake in ANT-Inform before changes in the composition of the founders. Considering that Mr. Zaitsev also retained his stake, it can be assumed, albeit with a minimal degree of probability, that the “census” simply identified the beneficiaries of the mysterious Cypriot offshore companies.

Here is another interesting fact: ATN-Inform and all the companies associated with it are, in one way or another, related to the Laminated Plastics Plant, where the chairman of the board of directors is the already mentioned Dmitry Zaitsev. 10 years ago, he managed to sell more than 50% of the plant’s shares at a very favorable price to Gazprom, while maintaining control over the enterprise and rental space within St. Petersburg. Maybe it's all about rental space and neighbor relations?

Instead of a conclusion

As my small investigation showed, a whole group of “friendly” people, perhaps taking advantage of the boundless trust of the already mentioned top manager of Gazprom Mezhregiongaz LLC N.P. Konovalenko, has been “withdrawing” hundreds of millions of dollars from Gazprom for several years now - and not without success. Meanwhile, the gas monopolist himself constantly complains about the lack of money and increases gas prices by 10–15% every year. Over the past five years, the cost of gas for the population has doubled and continues to grow. And as long as Gazprom continues to tolerate such holes in its budget, the trend is unlikely to change.

About the owner of our enterprise =) I was happy for the people! The author asked the question “how is the company still afloat”, I will answer - due to optimization of the number (read staff reduction) and the lack of dynamics of salary growth (at least in relation to inflation) over the past 5 years.

HOW TO “USE” A NATIONAL PROPERTY

The scale of how some companies make money from contracts with Gazprom subsidiaries is such that it’s amazing how the company is still afloat.

Everyone in our country knows that Gazprom is a national treasure of Russia. However, few people know how this very asset turns into the personal well-being of citizens and organizations “friendly” to the employees of the state-owned company - mainly those who are familiar with the “backstage kitchen” of this energy giant. Big money, as you know, loves silence, so everything happens silently for the gas monopolist.

There are practically no leaks, however, our editorial staff came across interesting documents from one of Gazprom’s large subsidiaries - Gazprom Mezhregiongaz LLC, which is responsible for selling gas on the domestic Russian market. It follows from them that Natalya Konovalenko, a graduate of the Russian Academy of Public Administration under the President of the Russian Federation and Deputy General Director for Economics and Finance, has been overlooking the attentive eyes of the scheme for “taking away” funds from the gas distribution organizations of OJSC Gazprom for many years.

The activities of the following legal entities, in my opinion, under N.P. Konovalenko, who occupies not the last position at OJSC Gazprom Mezhregiongaz and is in charge of government procurement, causes significant harm to the entire Gazprom, and with it the Russian Federation, which suffers from underpayment of taxes and withdrawal of funds to offshore companies - we are talking about “losses” of hundreds of millions of rubles annually. At the same time, the management of the Gazprom concern, represented by Alexey Miller, probably does not even suspect what is happening in the next office.

A MONOPOLY MUST BE A MONOPOLY

The Gazprom Mezhregiongaz Group provides gas supply to consumers through 48 gas sales subsidiaries. The huge colossus, which employs 160 thousand people, supplies “blue fuel” to the vast majority of the country’s population and a significant part of industry.

Of course, all this must have appropriate material support - such a huge structure constantly requires goods, work and various services. It was these needs that became the basis for large private businesses under Ms. Konovalenko, who took office in 2007.

It was during this period, perhaps with the best intentions - to make a profit for the benefit of the Gazprom Mezhregiongaz company - that a scheme for purchasing goods and services through an electronic platform was introduced, which, as it later turned out, contained a huge potential for corruption and abuse, and at all its stages, starting with the admission of superficially verified firms to tenders and ending with inattentively monitored prices for goods and services.

Until 2012, the role of the electronic platform where tenders were held was played by the company ANT-Inform LLC, co-founded by Anzhelika Prilepina. However, in 2012, the little-known company Gazenergoinform became a strategic partner of Gazprom Mezhregiongaz - it was appointed as the organizer of all competitive procedures for Gazprom companies. The company was headed by the same Prilepina.

As a result, Gazenergoinform overnight became a competitive agent for 212 Gazprom companies. From each contract concluded by these enterprises, Gazenergoinform receives 1.77% until 2016. Subsequently, the list was expanded to 226 Gazprom companies.

In theory, all willing suppliers submit applications for the tender, Gazprom must choose the best price-quality ratio and make the purchase. This is how competition, economy and efficiency are achieved - all together or separately. However, in reality, it turns out that among the winners you can often see the same companies: ANT-Inform LLC, Gazstroy North-West LLC, Project Technology LLC, and Arma LLC.

RAVEN TO CROW

Against this background, it is unlikely that anyone will be surprised by the fact that all of the above-mentioned companies, according to open sources, are closely affiliated with each other. For example, the organizer of tenders “Gazenergoinform” is the owner of 74% of the electronic platform “GazNeftetorg.ru”, where it places its tenders.

The company ANT-Inform is participating in the announced auction, which until 2012 owned 70% of Gazenergoinform and 49% of GazNeftetorg.ru. Along with it there is a “competitor” - Gazstroy North-West, among the founders of which... is the same ANT-Inform.

The connection between the remaining two companies participating in the tenders also exists: the general director of Arma, Alexandra Bumaga, is a co-founder of Project Technology.

But the connection between “Arma” and “ANT-Inform” does not lie on the surface, and its presence can be assumed based on family ties. Thus, the founder of “Arma” is a certain Tatyana Svitova from St. Petersburg. By a strange coincidence, a certain Natalya Svitova (probably the sister of Tatyana Svitova) is a co-founder of Audit-NT LLC. As they say, the circle is closed?

What does this mean: the same people or organizations participate in the announcement of the tender, in its conduct and choose the winners? At the same time, the total amount of contracts for 2013 between the structures of Gazprom Mezhregiongaz and these companies exceeded 1.1 billion rubles, and for the first half of 2014 amounted to more than 332 million rubles. If you only believe in the experts’ assumptions regarding the 30% increase in prices for goods and services, this group of individuals and legal entities received more than 400 million “net” rubles from Gazprom in just this year and a half.

In all these cash flows one can find, in one form or another, the participation of ANT-Inform LLC, which has been headed by Tatyana Savostenok for many years, as well as her colleagues in the St. Petersburg LLC Layered Plastics Plant - Dmitry Zaitsev, Angelika Prilepina and others.

In the photo: TOP MANAGER OF GAZPROM MEZHREGIONGAZ LLC N. P. KONOVALENKO

TRANSFER TO OFFSHORE?

For a long time, ANT-Inform was one of 300 companies owned by Gazprom Mezhregiongaz. However, in 2009, something both ordinary and at the same time surprising happened to one of the key suppliers of the gas giant - the company changed its owner.

The change, however, was formal - Audit-NT LLC sold the company to Teploinvest OJSC. All companies, one way or another, were controlled by Gazprom Mezhregiongaz, and therefore the deal could hardly attract attention. If not for one nuance: the selling price. Teploinvest bought one of the largest suppliers of the corporation, which supplies gas to the whole of Russia, for only 13 thousand rubles.

However, then no one really paid attention to this - in the end, the real owner remained the state, and it makes no difference whether it bought the company from itself for 13 thousand rubles, for 13 million or for 1 ruble.

Two years have passed, and ANT-Inform is being sold again, but this time “control” is already leaving the state for Cypriot offshore companies and private individuals. And again, the sale price, as it became known from semi-open sources, is... 13 thousand rubles.

It’s hard to believe, but it turns out that Gazprom sold one of its key suppliers for a symbolic sum in February 2011? The sale price was at least a thousand times less than expected: ANT-Inform’s net profit in 2010 was 397.1 million rubles, with revenue of 3.45 billion rubles. The company's net assets reached 684 million rubles by January 1, 2011. Based on these figures, as well as the competitions won on the informatization strategy of OJSC Gazprom, the value of the company should have been about 3 billion rubles, but instead it was sold at “internal” prices?

Who became the happy owner of an asset that passes Gazprom's billions through their accounts? 25% each went to two Cypriot offshore companies - Volneno Holdings Ltd and Delonaria Holdings Ltd, as well as St. Petersburg GEP Development. Another 24% was bought by a certain Dmitry Zaitsev, the namesake of the already familiar chairman of the board of directors of the St. Petersburg-based LLC Laminated Plastics Plant.

PRIVATIZE YOUR PROFIT

The timing of the sale of ANT-Inform shares to offshore companies was not at all accidental. Until 2011, Gazprom distributed the main tenders, and the company participated in them as an internal, “its” supplier. When most of the necessary competitions were won and the turn came to make a profit from multimillion-dollar contracts with Gazprom, the company was “taken offshore”, apparently in order to hide real income from Russian tax authorities, and, probably, to support the budget of the Republic of Cyprus.

By the end of 2012, the situation with ANT-Inform shareholders changed again - they became entirely individuals. Dmitry Zaitsev increased his share to 25%, Natalya Svitova, Mikhail Botvinkin and Natalia Tikhonchuk each received 20%, and Daria Sergeeva controlled 10%. Thus, the list was changed to “physicists” at the moment when the state announced a campaign to combat offshore schemes and companies in government procurement. Moreover, the same persons remained among the owners. For example, Mr. Botvinkin is the founder and director of the already familiar GEP Development, which owned a stake in ANT-Inform before changes in the composition of the founders. Considering that Mr. Zaitsev also retained his stake, it can be assumed, albeit with a minimal degree of probability, that the “census” simply identified the beneficiaries of the mysterious Cypriot offshore companies.

Here is another interesting fact: ATN-Inform and all the companies associated with it are, in one way or another, related to the Laminated Plastics Plant, where the chairman of the board of directors is the already mentioned Dmitry Zaitsev. 10 years ago, he managed to sell more than 50% of the plant’s shares at a very favorable price to Gazprom, while maintaining control over the enterprise and rental space within St. Petersburg. Maybe it's all about rental space and neighbor relations?

INSTEAD OF CONCLUSION

As my small investigation showed, a whole group of “friendly” people, perhaps taking advantage of the boundless trust of the already mentioned top manager of Gazprom Mezhregiongaz LLC N.P. Konovalenko, has been “withdrawing” hundreds of millions of dollars from Gazprom for several years now - and not without success. Meanwhile, the gas monopolist himself constantly complains about the lack of money and increases gas prices by 10-15% every year. Over the past five years, the cost of gas for the population has doubled and continues to grow. And as long as Gazprom continues to tolerate such holes in its budget, the trend is unlikely to change.

What happens behind the scenes of Gazprom Mezhregiongaz tenders

Everyone in our country knows that Gazprom is a national treasure of Russia. However, few people know how this very asset turns into the personal well-being of citizens and organizations “friendly” to the employees of the state-owned company - mainly those who are familiar with the “backstage kitchen” of this energy giant. Big money, as you know, loves silence, so everything happens silently for the gas monopolist.

There are practically no leaks, but our editorial staff came across interesting documents from one of Gazprom’s large subsidiaries, Gazprom Mezhregiongaz LLC, which is responsible for selling gas on the domestic Russian market. It follows from them that Natalya Konovalenko, a graduate of the Russian Academy of Public Administration under the President of the Russian Federation and Deputy General Director for Economics and Finance, has been overlooking the attentive eyes of the scheme for “taking away” funds from the gas distribution organizations of OJSC Gazprom for many years.

The activities of the following legal entities, in my opinion, under N.P. Konovalenko, who occupies not the last position at OJSC Gazprom Mezhregiongaz and is in charge of government procurement, causes significant harm to the entire Gazprom, and with it the Russian Federation, which suffers from underpayment of taxes and withdrawal of funds to offshore companies - we are talking about “losses” of hundreds of millions of rubles annually. At the same time, the management of the Gazprom concern, represented by Alexey Miller, probably does not even suspect what is happening in the next office.

A monopoly must be a monopoly

The Gazprom Mezhregiongaz Group provides gas supply to consumers through 48 gas sales subsidiaries. The huge colossus, which employs 160 thousand people, supplies “blue fuel” to the vast majority of the country’s population and a significant part of industry.

Of course, all this must have appropriate material support - such a huge structure constantly requires goods, work and various services. It was these needs that became the basis for large private businesses under Ms. Konovalenko, who took office in 2007.

It was during this period, perhaps with the best intentions - to make a profit for the benefit of the Gazprom Mezhregiongaz company - that a scheme for purchasing goods and services through an electronic platform was introduced, which, as it later turned out, contained a huge potential for corruption and abuse, and at all its stages, starting with the admission of superficially verified firms to tenders and ending with inattentively monitored prices for goods and services.

Until 2012, the role of the electronic platform where tenders were held was played by the company ANT-Inform LLC, co-founded by Anzhelika Prilepina. However, in 2012, the little-known company Gazenergoinform became a strategic partner of Gazprom Mezhregiongaz - it was appointed as the organizer of all competitive procedures for Gazprom companies. The company was headed by the same Prilepina.

As a result, Gazenergoinform overnight became a competitive agent for 212 Gazprom companies. From each contract concluded by these enterprises, Gazenergoinform receives 1.77% until 2016. Subsequently, the list was expanded to 226 Gazprom companies.

In theory, all willing suppliers submit applications for the tender, Gazprom must choose the best price-quality ratio and make the purchase. This is how competition, economy and efficiency are achieved - all together or separately. However, in reality, it turns out that among the winners you can often see the same companies: ANT-Inform LLC, Gazstroy North-West LLC, Project Technology LLC, and Arma LLC.

Raven to crow

Against this background, it is unlikely that anyone will be surprised by the fact that all of the above-mentioned companies, according to open sources, are closely affiliated with each other. For example, the organizer of tenders “Gazenergoinform” is the owner of 74% of the electronic platform “GazNeftetorg.ru”, where it places its tenders.

The company ANT-Inform is participating in the announced auction, which until 2012 owned 70% of Gazenergoinform and 49% of GazNeftetorg.ru. Along with it there is a “competitor” - Gazstroy North-West, among the founders of which... is the same ANT-Inform.

The connection between the remaining two companies participating in the tenders also exists: the general director of Arma, Alexandra Bumaga, is a co-founder of Project Technology. But the connection between “Arma” and “ANT-Inform” does not lie on the surface, and its presence can be assumed based on family ties. Thus, the founder of “Arma” is a certain Tatyana Svitova from St. Petersburg. By a strange coincidence, a certain Natalya Svitova (probably the sister of Tatyana Svitova) is a co-founder of Audit-NT LLC. As they say, the circle is closed?

What does this mean: the same people or organizations participate in the announcement of the tender, in its conduct and choose the winners? At the same time, the total amount of contracts for 2013 between the structures of Gazprom Mezhregiongaz and these companies exceeded 1.1 billion rubles, and for the first half of 2014 amounted to more than 332 million rubles. If you only believe in the experts’ assumptions regarding the 30% increase in prices for goods and services, this group of individuals and legal entities received more than 400 million “net” rubles from Gazprom in just this year and a half.

In all these cash flows one can find in one form or another the participation of ANT-Inform LLC, which has been headed by Tatyana Savostenok for many years, as well as her colleagues at the St. Petersburg LLC Layered Plastics Plant - Dmitry Zaitsev, Angelika Prilepina and others.

In theory, applications for the tender are submitted by all interested suppliers, Gazprom must choose the best price-quality ratio and make purchases. Photo: yugorsk-tr.gazprom.ru

Offshore withdrawals?

For a long time, ANT-Inform was one of 300 companies owned by Gazprom Mezhregiongaz. However, in 2009, something both ordinary and surprising happened to one of the gas giant’s key suppliers: the company changed its owner.

The change, however, was formal - Audit-NT LLC sold the company to Teploinvest OJSC. All companies, one way or another, were controlled by Gazprom Mezhregiongaz, and therefore the deal could hardly attract attention. If not for one nuance: the selling price. Teploinvest bought one of the largest suppliers of the corporation, which supplies gas to the whole of Russia, for only 13 thousand rubles.

However, then no one really paid attention to this - in the end, the real owner remained the state, and it makes no difference whether it bought the company from itself for 13 thousand rubles, for 13 million or for 1 ruble.

Two years have passed, and ANT-Inform is being sold again, but this time “control” is already leaving the state for Cypriot offshore companies and private individuals. And again, the sale price, as it became known from semi-open sources, is... 13 thousand rubles.

It’s hard to believe, but it turns out that Gazprom sold one of its key suppliers for a symbolic sum in February 2011? The sale price was at least a thousand times less than expected: ANT-Inform’s net profit in 2010 was 397.1 million rubles, with revenue of 3.45 billion rubles. The company's net assets reached 684 million rubles by January 1, 2011. Based on these figures, as well as the competitions won on the informatization strategy of OJSC Gazprom, the value of the company should have been about 3 billion rubles, but instead it was sold at “internal” prices?

Who became the happy owner of an asset that passes Gazprom's billions through their accounts? 25% each went to two Cypriot offshore companies - Volneno Holdings Ltd and Delonaria Holdings Ltd, as well as St. Petersburg-based GEP Development. Another 24% was bought by a certain Dmitry Zaitsev, the namesake of the already familiar chairman of the board of directors of the St. Petersburg-based LLC Laminated Plastics Plant.

Privatize profits

The timing of the sale of ANT-Inform shares to offshore companies was not at all accidental. Until 2011, Gazprom distributed the main tenders, and the company participated in them as an internal, “its” supplier. When most of the necessary competitions were won and the turn came to make a profit from multimillion-dollar contracts with Gazprom, the company was “taken offshore”, apparently in order to hide real income from Russian tax authorities, and, probably, to support the budget of the Republic of Cyprus.

By the end of 2012, the situation with ANT-Inform shareholders changed again - they became entirely individuals. Dmitry Zaitsev increased his share to 25%, Natalya Svitova, Mikhail Botvinkin and Natalia Tikhonchuk each received 20%, and Daria Sergeeva controlled 10%. Thus, the list was changed to “physicists” at the moment when the state announced a campaign to combat offshore schemes and companies in government procurement. Moreover, the same persons remained among the owners. For example, Mr. Botvinkin is the founder and director of the already familiar GEP Development, which owned a stake in ANT-Inform before changes in the composition of the founders. Considering that Mr. Zaitsev also retained his stake, it can be assumed, albeit with a minimal degree of probability, that the “census” simply identified the beneficiaries of the mysterious Cypriot offshore companies.

Here is another interesting fact: ATN-Inform and all the companies associated with it are, in one way or another, related to the Laminated Plastics Plant, where the chairman of the board of directors is the already mentioned Dmitry Zaitsev. 10 years ago, he managed to sell more than 50% of the plant’s shares at a very favorable price to Gazprom, while maintaining control over the enterprise and rental space within St. Petersburg. Maybe it's all about rental space and neighbor relations?

Instead of a conclusion

As my small investigation showed, a whole group of “friendly” people, perhaps taking advantage of the boundless trust of the already mentioned top manager of Gazprom Mezhregiongaz LLC N.P. Konovalenko, has been “withdrawing” hundreds of millions of dollars from Gazprom for several years now - and not without success. Meanwhile, the gas monopolist himself constantly complains about the lack of money and increases gas prices by 10–15% every year. Over the past five years, the cost of gas for the population has doubled and continues to grow. And as long as Gazprom continues to tolerate such holes in its budget, the trend is unlikely to change.

Deal of the year: as a member of the board of Gazprom, he sold his brother a 12% stake in the bank of the president’s “inner circle”

In March 2014, Rossiya Bank came under sanctions from the US Treasury due to events in Ukraine. As stated in the department’s press release, “SB Rossiya” is controlled by the “inner circle” of President Putin, “acts in the interests of and provides material or other support to high-ranking Russian officials.” As the investigation showed, “ Novaya Gazeta", Bank Rossiya is of interest not only to Russian officials, but also to members of the board of Gazprom. In February 2014, the structure of the gas monopoly sold 12% of the bank’s shares to two companies - Overpass-Invest and Oberon Estate. Ivan Mironov, the half-brother of Gazprom board member Kirill Seleznev, is related to both companies.

Banking schemes

Interfax first reported the deal on February 3, 2014. Then, instead of OJSC Gazprom Gazoraspredelenie, Overpass-Invest and Oberon Estate appeared on the list of shareholders of AB Rossiya. As of today, both companies collectively own 11.7% of the bank's shares. This is the second largest stake after the share of the main owner of Rossiya, Yuri Kovalchuk, a longtime acquaintance of President Putin. Both companies own even more shares in the bank than the president’s other friends, Nikolai Shamalov and Gennady Timchenko.

The Overpass-Invest company is owned by young entrepreneurs from St. Petersburg - Tatyana Svitova and Ivan Mironov. Oberon Estate is formally owned by a company from Cyprus, Terramart Development Ltd, which, in turn, is owned by a structure from the Cayman Islands, CIS Strategic Industries Investment Fund Ltd. But, as Vedomosti and Forbes reported, Oberon Estate is controlled by Ivan Mironov.

Mironov is 30 years old, he is from St. Petersburg, he lived on Bela Kun Street. Tatyana Mironova and Gazprom board member Kirill Seleznev were registered at the same address. The extract at our disposal for this address shows: Seleznev is the first son of Mironova, Mironov is the second. It turns out that Seleznev and Mironov are half-brothers.

Svitova, co-owner of Overpass-Invest, is also not a stranger to Seleznev. She is the daughter of Elena Svitova, the former vice-president of Gazenergoprombank, where Kirill Seleznev headed the board of directors.

How did this “brotherly” deal take place?

It all started in 2008. Then, at the height of the crisis, Sobinbank's position was shaken. Gazenergoprombank came to his aid, acquiring 100% of his shares in October 2008. Gazenergoprombank belonged to Gazprom structures; gas payments were collected through it from the population and enterprises. The largest share in the bank was owned by OJSC Gazprom Gazoraspredeleniye (73.3%). This structure belongs to Gazprom Mezhregiongaz, where Kirill Seleznev works as director. Seleznev also heads the board of directors of Gazprom Gas Distribution.

In 2010, Gazenergoprombank and Rossiya Bank decided to merge. As a result of this merger, the assets of Rossiya Bank more than doubled, and the shareholders of Gazenergoprombank received shares in the merged bank. Thus, Gazprom Gas Distribution became the owner of 12.27% of Rossiya.

And in December 2013, the board of directors of Gazprom Gas Distribution, headed by Kirill Seleznev, decided to sell this stake as “non-core”. The “non-core asset,” as it has now become clear, went to relatives and close people.

Ivan Mironov’s interests in the banking business are not limited to “Russia”. He and his company Overpass-Invest also own shares in Finservice Bank. This bank previously belonged to Sobinbank, but in 2013, Ivan Mironov and other people close to Seleznev, for example, Natalia Konovalenko, Seleznev’s deputy at Gazprom Mezhregiongaz, appeared among its shareholders.

Financial analysts contacted by Novaya Gazeta refused to publicly assess the value of 12% of Rossiya Bank “for obvious reasons.”

Rossiya Bank, as well as Gazprom Gas Distribution, refused to answer Novaya Gazeta’s questions about the new owners of the shares, as well as about the sale price.

According to rough estimates, the cost of this package could be about 6-8 billion rubles. Where did the young entrepreneur Mironov get the funds for the purchase?

Mironov and his partners are favored by Gazprom; they are related to many companies that are lucky with government contracts from the gas monopoly, as well as large-scale projects where Gazprom is an investor.

Convention and Exhibition Center

In 2008, the ExpoForum company was created in St. Petersburg. It is building a new international convention and exhibition center near Pulkovo airport. The project is being developed within the framework of a cooperation agreement between the government of St. Petersburg and the Gazprom group, the investment volume is estimated at $1 billion. ExpoForum is owned by two companies: GEP-Development (51%) and Balt-klin-komplekt (49%).

GEP-Development used to be part of the Gazenergoprombank group (the original investor in the construction), and today it is 65% owned by Gazprom Teploenergo ( subsidiary"Gazprom Mezhregiongaz"). Until recently, the General Director of ExpoForum was Anatoly Erkulov. Today he works as Kirill Seleznev’s deputy at Gazprom Mezhregiongaz.

The second owner of ExpoForum, Balt-klin-komplekt, is 26% owned by the Cyprus company Exlaribo Holdings Co. Ltd. This Cypriot structure is owned by a familiar company from the Cayman Islands, CIS Strategic Industries Investment Fund Ltd, the ultimate owner of Oberon Estate.

In 2010, the owners of Expo Forum also acquired the Lenexpo exhibition complex. A year later, all Lenexpo assets (exhibition portfolio, trademarks, information bases exhibition projects) came under the control of ExpoForum, which also leased all real estate and exhibition pavilions of Lenexpo.

In 2013, the ExpoForum business was restructured. The construction of the convention and exhibition center was undertaken by the ExpoForum company itself, and the management of the exhibitions by ExpoForum-International.

This company today manages the Lenexpo exhibition complex, it occupies 40% industry market North-West region; she will also manage the convention and exhibition center in Pulkovo when construction is completed.

What is important: 20% of ExpoForum-International belongs to Ivan Mironov, who also works as deputy general director of the company. It turns out that the money will be invested by Gazprom structures, and the projects will be managed by a company whose co-owner is the brother of the monopoly’s top manager?

Transportation of petroleum products

Oberon Estate owns 20% in the company ZAO Neftetransport. This company was created in 2002, today it is one of the ten largest transport enterprises Russia, says its website. According to the SKRIN database, until 2010 Neftetransport was part of the Transgroup Invest AS holding, which until recently belonged to the Deputy Mayor of Moscow for Transport, Maxim Liksutov. In 2013, due to the adoption of a law prohibiting officials from owning foreign assets, the holding’s shares were transferred to Liksutov’s wife Tatyana (the spouses divorced soon after the shares were re-registered).

But in 2010, the Liksutovs got strong partners. 50% of Neftetransport was acquired by three companies: Oberon Estate (20%), Transstroy (20%) and Alliance-N (10%).

"Transstroy", according to according to the Unified State Register of Legal Entities, owned by Kirill Seleznev’s subordinates at Gazprom and the partners of his brother Mironov. Anatoly Erkulov and Natalia Konovalenko, Seleznev’s deputies at Gazprom Mezhregiongaz, each own 25% of the company. Another 25% of Transstroy belongs to Mikhail Botvinkin and Natalya Svitova. Botvinkin is a Moscow lawyer, former member of the board of directors of Gazenergoprombank; today, together with Ivan Mironov, he owns shares in Finservice Bank and heads its board of directors. Natalya Svitova is the daughter of Elena Svitova, former vice-president of Gazenergoprombank, and the sister of Tatyana Svitova, co-owner of the Overpass-Invest company, which bought shares of Rossiya Bank.

The presence of Gazprom top managers in the capital of Neftetransport seems no coincidence: the company transports petroleum products to Gazprom neftekhim Salavat OJSC, and also leases tanks to Gazpromtrans.

Mikhail Botvinkin did not answer questions from Novaya Gazeta, transmitted through his representative. Tatyana Liksutova and the director of Neftetransport also did not comment on the situation.

Gas stations

On April 20, 2010, the company “TD “Alfa-Trade” was formed. Less than six months had passed since the founding of the company, in September 2010 it filed a petition with the FAS to lease “fixed production assets of Gazprom Gazenergoset OJSC in the amount of 74.2%” of their book value (“Gazprom Gazenergoset” is controlled by Gazprom Mezhregiongaz "Selezneva). The request was apparently granted, because, as follows from the reports of Gazprom Gazenergoseti, already on October 1, 2010, Alfa-Trade TH received more than 50 gas stations for rent in various regions of Russia. These gas stations operate today under the Gazprom gas station brand.

The gas monopoly continued to fuel the young company's dramatic rise. In 2011, another Gazprom subsidiary, Gazprom neftekhim Salavat, also leased its regional network of gas stations (Salavat gas stations) to the same Alfa-Trade trading house. The board of directors of Gazprom neftekhim Salavat at that time was headed by Kirill Seleznev. The network included more than 30 gas stations in the Republic of Bashkortostan and the Orenburg region.

The development of TD Alfa-Trade has been rapid. In 2011, the company's revenue increased almost 8 times compared to 2010 (the year the company was founded): from 4.6 billion rubles to 35 billion; for 2012, revenue amounted to 58.6 billion rubles. What is the secret of success?

“The Alfa-Trade trading house is owned by the same Cypriot company Terramart Development Ltd that owns Oberon Estate, which, as Vedomosti and Forbes wrote, is controlled by Ivan Mironov.

The general director of TD Alfa-Trade did not answer Novaya Gazeta’s questions.

Percentage of contracts

In March 2009, the Gazenergoinform company was founded. In 2012, according to the SKRIN database, it acquired a new owner - ZAO Gazoil Technologies. And things went uphill. In the same 2012, Gazenergoinform became, without exaggeration, a strategically important partner of Gazprom. The company won the Gazprom Mezhregiongaz competition for “organizing, preparing and conducting competitive procedures for the procurement of goods, works and services” for the needs of regional gas sales companies and gas distribution organizations. In other words, Gazenergoinform became an agent or organizer of all competitive procedures for Gazprom companies. Gazenergoinform had no competitors: no one else submitted applications.

The auction documentation lists 212 Gazprom companies for whose needs Gazenergoinform will conduct competitive procedures. From each contract concluded by these 212 enterprises, Gazenergoinform will receive 1.77% until 2016.

In 2013, Gazprom Mezhregiongaz, headed by Seleznev, held a similar competition. Gazenergoinform again won without competition and became an agent for 14 more Gazprom structures; from each concluded contract the company will receive the same 1.77% until 2016.

Total - 1.77% from each contract of 226 Gazprom companies.

At Gazenergoinform you can find overlaps with the companies of Ivan Mironov and his partners.

"Gazenergoinform" is located at: St. Petersburg, st. Sedova, 142, letter A, room 8n. At the same address, in the same premises, the company ExpoForum-International is located, where Mironov works as deputy general director and owns 20%.

A participant of Gazenergoinform, CJSC Gazoil-Technologies, is owned by the Cyprus company Nodatent Investments Ltd. The same Cypriot structure owns a significant stake in GEP-Development, which is developing the project of the convention and exhibition center in Pulkovo and owns the main part of ExpoForum.

Gazenergoinform did not comment on these intersections or name the owners of the company.

Construction

The Gazenergoservice company was founded in 2006, and since 2013 it began to receive large contracts from Gazprom over and over again. Over the past year and a half, this company, according to Novaya Gazeta estimates, has concluded contracts worth 31 billion rubles with Gazprom structures. IN Lately Gazenergoservis managed to bypass even such long-time Gazprom contractors as Ziyad Manasir’s Stroygazconsulting in competitions. Gazenergoservice concluded the largest contract at the end of 2013 for construction and installation work at the Urengoyskoye field - for 12.6 billion rubles.

In 2013, according to SKRIN, 71% of Gazenergoservice was acquired by three companies: TransBusiness CJSC (51%), Investment Real Estate LLC (10%) and the Cypriot structure Vonalinski Ltd (10%).

TransBusiness is located at: St. Petersburg, st. Sedova, 142, letter A, room 5n. In the same building, in the next room, there is Ivan Mironov’s company “ExpoForum-International”.

According to the Unified State Register of Legal Entities, the owner of TransBusiness is Oleg Lyubimov. Lyubimov previously worked for companies apparently associated with Mironov. For example, he was the director of Business Assistance LLC. Today this company belongs to Oberon Estate. Since 2009, Lyubimov went to work for Gazprom structures; he heads the reconstruction department at Gazprom Gas Distribution, where the board of directors is headed by Kirill Seleznev.

Novaya Gazeta managed to contact Oleg Lyubimov. He said that he has nothing to do with TransBusiness, and our information taken from the Unified State Register of Legal Entities is incorrect.

“Investment Property” belongs to the company “Astrion-Finance”. This company is located in the same building in St. Petersburg on Sedova Street. It is one of the main shareholders of Lenexpo and is controlled by the Cypriot structure of Altria Industries Investments Ltd. The same Cypriot company previously owned Oberon Estate LLC, which purchased shares of Rossiya Bank.

Do these intersections mean that Ivan Mironov and Kirill Seleznev could be related to Gazenergoservis? The brothers refused to answer all questions from Novaya Gazeta. The representative of Gazprom Mezhregiongaz only said, without explaining the reasons, that they refused to comment on anything.

Mikhail Sirotkin and Kirill Seleznev are at the center of another scandal. The traces of a grandiose scam confidently lead to higher floors - to odious top managers.

Recently, a corruption scheme became public that allowed employees of OJSC Gazprom Mezhregiongaz to withdraw huge sums from the budget of the Russian gas monopoly. According to some reports, the process of “cutting” Gazprom’s money was led by Deputy General Director for Economics and Finance Natalia Konovalenko.

Traces of fraud led to the leadership of Gazprom

As the media wrote, Konovalenko, who oversees government procurement at Gazprom Mezhregiongaz, together with several of her acquaintances, created a network of front companies that over and over again won auctions to supply the company with various goods and services. ANT-Inform LLC, Gazstroy North-West LLC, Project Technology LLC and Arma LLC turned out to be cross-connected by their owners, founders and beneficiaries. According to very careful preliminary estimates, the activities of this network led to an overestimation of Mezhregiongaz’s costs by approximately 30%. Which in absolute numbers brought its creators about 400 million rubles in just a year and a half – from the beginning of 2013 to the middle of 2014. Next, we will tell you how Mikhail Sirotkin and Kirill Seleznev from Gazprom managed to steal hundreds of millions using seemingly simple schemes.

Even such a huge, branched and complex organized company Gazprom, like Gazprom, is unlikely to watch indifferently as unscrupulous employees siphon off fortunes from its budget. In the end, this is precisely why internal security services, control and audit departments and other specific bodies exist. There is only one way to explain the fact that the attackers “milked” Gazprom with impunity for years, pumping state money into their own pockets - if we assume that they were covered by someone very, very influential, one of the top top managers of the state corporation.

It was not easy to identify such a person, but it was quite possible. We will go through the entire chain, starting from the “purchasing and cheating” group of companies that built its nest in Gazprom Mezhregiongaz, and to their high-ranking “roof”, which, in all likelihood, did not allow these financial frauds to happen for free.

Conspiracy of Substitutes

So, the role of Deputy General Director Natalia Konovalenko is already clear to us: together with her acquaintances, she organized the entire scheme - from control of the electronic platform on which tenders were posted, to shell companies that raised the cost of purchases necessary for Mezhreginogaz and then withdraw the resulting “delta” in your favor.

One of Konovalenko’s closest colleagues is Anatoly Erkulov, also deputy general director of Mezhregiongaz, but for investments and capital construction. At the same time, he heads Gazprom Investgazification LLC and owns 25% of the shares of a certain Transstroy company. And the other 25% of its shares are owned by Ms. Konovalenko herself. Once again we see a complex interweaving of interests, literally repeating the distribution of roles in the corruption scheme of shell companies created specifically for cutting up government procurement.

There is also another deputy general director of Mezhregiongaz in this company - and since 2012, also a member of the board and head of the department for property management and corporate relations of Gazprom itself - Elena Mikhailova, who oversees issues of corporate and property relations in the company. Ms. Mikhailova, who had previously worked as a modest lawyer in the Private Law company, was appointed to her responsible post at the age of 26. One of her first tasks at her new job was to transfer the assets of regional sales companies under the control of Mezhregiongaz. Some of the assets strangely evaporated along the way, while others, such as the complex of buildings on Raushskaya Embankment owned by Mosenergo, directly opposite the Kremlin, were sold several times below market value. And not just anyone, but “Private Law,” which leads to certain thoughts about the role of Mikhailova herself in the process.

But a deputy general is just a deputy general; the caliber is still not suitable for protecting a large-scale corruption scheme. Who helped several deputies, who united to improve their own well-being using not entirely legal methods, not to attract unnecessary attention to their activities?

Loving husband

Elena Mikhailova’s husband is currently Mikhail Sirotkin, head of the corporate cost management department of the “big” Gazprom. In his position, he controls all government procurement carried out as central office the Russian gas giant and its numerous subsidiaries. And apparently, it is he who has a direct connection to the fact that since 2012, the electronic trading platform, on which Natalia Konovalenko was slowly playing out frauds with Mezhregiongaz’s money, suddenly began to serve the purchases of another 211 Gazprom companies, and the number of tenders and the volume passing through The area of ​​funds has grown abruptly by almost several orders of magnitude. In any case, it was in 2012 that Sirotkin headed the corporate expenses department.

For the supposed role of “godfather”, or even think tank Sirotkin is ideally suited to the entire operation of siphoning hundreds of millions of budget rubles from Gazprom into personal pockets. For example, he loves to work and relax in Europe, and he does this not alone or with his wife, but in fun company female models from fashion agencies. In 2012, he was accompanied to France by fashion model Kristina Voronina, and in 2013, he visited Switzerland and Italy with another model, Alexandra Chebotareva. True, he went to France with Angelina Firsova, and in 2014 he exchanged her for Elena Eleonskaya. Unlike other girls, the latter did not graduate from modeling courses, but from the Academy of the Ministry of Internal Affairs.

In everyday life, Mr. Sirotkin prefers comfort. Therefore, over the past few years, he has acquired several real estate properties, including an apartment in Bryusov Lane, literally a hundred meters from the Kremlin, an excellent cottage in the Rublyovsky village of Gorki-2, a couple of apartments in the elite boarding house “Pearl” near Moscow, and a villa in France. We don't even have to talk about little things like the Porsche 911 Carrera 4S.

An official salary is unlikely to be enough for all these elements of a luxurious life, even if it is the salary of a top manager of the richest Russian company. So the 400 million rubles stolen from Gazprom Mezhregiongaz would come in handy here. And there are no guarantees that the head of the corporate cost management department did not fit into any other schemes for redistributing financial flows from the state or corporate budget into his own pockets.

Retrospective

The scale of how some companies make money from contracts with Gazprom subsidiaries is such that it’s amazing how the company is still afloat.

Everyone in our country knows that Gazprom is a national treasure of Russia. However, few people know how this very asset turns into the personal well-being of citizens and organizations “friendly” to the employees of the state-owned company - mainly those who are familiar with the “backstage kitchen” of this energy giant. Big money, as you know, loves silence, so everything happens silently for the gas monopolist.

There are practically no leaks, but our editorial staff came across interesting documents from one of Gazprom’s large subsidiaries, Gazprom Mezhregiongaz LLC, which is responsible for selling gas on the domestic Russian market. It follows from them that Natalya Konovalenko, a graduate of the Russian Academy of Public Administration under the President of the Russian Federation and Deputy General Director for Economics and Finance, has been overlooking the attentive eyes of the scheme for “taking away” funds from the gas distribution organizations of OJSC Gazprom for many years.

The activities of the following legal entities, in my opinion, under N.P. Konovalenko, who occupies not the last position at OJSC Gazprom Mezhregiongaz and is in charge of government procurement, causes significant harm to the entire Gazprom, and with it the Russian Federation, which suffers from underpayment of taxes and withdrawal of funds to offshore companies - we are talking about “losses” of hundreds of millions of rubles annually. At the same time, the management of the Gazprom concern, represented by Alexey Miller, probably does not even suspect what is happening in the next office.

A MONOPOLY MUST BE A MONOPOLY

The Gazprom Mezhregiongaz Group provides gas supply to consumers through 48 gas sales subsidiaries. The huge colossus, which employs 160 thousand people, supplies “blue fuel” to the vast majority of the country’s population and a significant part of industry.

Of course, all this must have appropriate material support - such a huge structure constantly requires goods, work and various services. It was these needs that became the basis for large private businesses under Ms. Konovalenko, who took office in 2007.

It was during this period, perhaps with the best intentions - to make a profit for the benefit of the Gazprom Mezhregiongaz company - that a scheme for purchasing goods and services through an electronic platform was introduced, which, as it later turned out, contained a huge potential for corruption and abuse, and at all its stages, starting with the admission of superficially verified firms to tenders and ending with inattentively monitored prices for goods and services.

Until 2012, the role of the electronic platform where tenders were held was played by the company ANT-Inform LLC, co-founded by Anzhelika Prilepina. However, in 2012, the little-known company Gazenergoinform became a strategic partner of Gazprom Mezhregiongaz - it was appointed as the organizer of all competitive procedures for Gazprom companies. The company was headed by the same Prilepina.

As a result, Gazenergoinform overnight became a competitive agent for 212 Gazprom companies. From each contract concluded by these enterprises, Gazenergoinform receives 1.77% until 2016. Subsequently, the list was expanded to 226 Gazprom companies.

In theory, all willing suppliers submit applications for the tender, Gazprom must choose the best price-quality ratio and make the purchase. This is how competition, economy and efficiency are achieved - all together or separately. However, in reality, it turns out that among the winners you can often see the same companies: ANT-Inform LLC, Gazstroy North-West LLC, Project Technology LLC, and Arma LLC.

RAVEN TO CROW

Against this background, it is unlikely that anyone will be surprised by the fact that all of the above-mentioned companies, according to open sources, are closely affiliated with each other. For example, the organizer of tenders “Gazenergoinform” is the owner of 74% of the electronic platform “GazNeftetorg.ru”, where it places its tenders.

The company ANT-Inform is participating in the announced auction, which until 2012 owned 70% of Gazenergoinform and 49% of GazNeftetorg.ru. Along with it there is a “competitor” - Gazstroy North-West, among the founders of which... is the same ANT-Inform.

The connection between the remaining two companies participating in the tenders also exists: the general director of Arma, Alexandra Bumaga, is a co-founder of Project Technology.

But the connection between “Arma” and “ANT-Inform” does not lie on the surface, and its presence can be assumed based on family ties. Thus, the founder of “Arma” is a certain Tatyana Svitova from St. Petersburg. By a strange coincidence, a certain Natalya Svitova (probably the sister of Tatyana Svitova) is a co-founder of Audit-NT LLC. As they say, the circle is closed?

What does this mean: the same people or organizations participate in the announcement of the tender, in its conduct and choose the winners? At the same time, the total amount of contracts for 2013 between the structures of Gazprom Mezhregiongaz and these companies exceeded 1.1 billion rubles, and for the first half of 2014 amounted to more than 332 million rubles. If you only believe in the experts’ assumptions regarding the 30% increase in prices for goods and services, this group of individuals and legal entities received more than 400 million “net” rubles from Gazprom in just this year and a half.

In all these cash flows one can find in one form or another the participation of ANT-Inform LLC, which has been headed by Tatyana Savostenok for many years, as well as her colleagues at the St. Petersburg LLC Layered Plastics Plant - Dmitry Zaitsev, Angelika Prilepina and others.

In the photo: TOP MANAGER OF GAZPROM MEZHREGIONGAZ LLC N. P. KONOVALENKO

TRANSFER TO OFFSHORE?

For a long time, ANT-Inform was one of 300 companies owned by Gazprom Mezhregiongaz. However, in 2009, something both ordinary and surprising happened to one of the gas giant’s key suppliers: the company changed its owner.

The change, however, was formal - Audit-NT LLC sold the company to Teploinvest OJSC. All companies, one way or another, were controlled by Gazprom Mezhregiongaz, and therefore the deal could hardly attract attention. If not for one nuance: the selling price. Teploinvest bought one of the largest suppliers of the corporation, which supplies gas to the whole of Russia, for only 13 thousand rubles.

However, then no one really paid attention to this - in the end, the real owner remained the state, and it makes no difference whether it bought the company from itself for 13 thousand rubles, for 13 million or for 1 ruble.

Two years have passed, and ANT-Inform is being sold again, but this time “control” is already leaving the state for Cypriot offshore companies and private individuals. And again, the sale price, as it became known from semi-open sources, is... 13 thousand rubles.

It’s hard to believe, but it turns out that Gazprom sold one of its key suppliers for a symbolic sum in February 2011? The sale price was at least a thousand times less than expected: ANT-Inform’s net profit in 2010 was 397.1 million rubles, with revenue of 3.45 billion rubles. The company's net assets reached 684 million rubles by January 1, 2011. Based on these figures, as well as the competitions won on the informatization strategy of OJSC Gazprom, the value of the company should have been about 3 billion rubles, but instead it was sold at “internal” prices?

Who became the happy owner of an asset that passes Gazprom's billions through their accounts? 25% each went to two Cypriot offshore companies - Volneno Holdings Ltd and Delonaria Holdings Ltd, as well as St. Petersburg-based GEP Development. Another 24% was bought by a certain Dmitry Zaitsev, the namesake of the already familiar chairman of the board of directors of the St. Petersburg-based LLC Laminated Plastics Plant.

PRIVATIZE YOUR PROFIT

The timing of the sale of ANT-Inform shares to offshore companies was not at all accidental. Until 2011, Gazprom distributed the main tenders, and the company participated in them as an internal, “its” supplier. When most of the necessary competitions were won and the turn came to make a profit from multimillion-dollar contracts with Gazprom, the company was “taken offshore”, apparently in order to hide real income from Russian tax authorities, and, probably, to support the budget of the Republic of Cyprus.

By the end of 2012, the situation with ANT-Inform shareholders changed again - they became entirely individuals. Dmitry Zaitsev increased his share to 25%, Natalya Svitova, Mikhail Botvinkin and Natalia Tikhonchuk each received 20%, and Daria Sergeeva controlled 10%. Thus, the list was changed to “physicists” at the moment when the state announced a campaign to combat offshore schemes and companies in government procurement. Moreover, the same persons remained among the owners. For example, Mr. Botvinkin is the founder and director of the already familiar GEP Development, which owned a stake in ANT-Inform before changes in the composition of the founders. Considering that Mr. Zaitsev also retained his stake, it can be assumed, albeit with a minimal degree of probability, that the “census” simply identified the beneficiaries of the mysterious Cypriot offshore companies.

Here is another interesting fact: ATN-Inform and all the companies associated with it are, in one way or another, related to the Laminated Plastics Plant, where the chairman of the board of directors is the already mentioned Dmitry Zaitsev. 10 years ago, he managed to sell more than 50% of the plant’s shares at a very favorable price to Gazprom, while maintaining control over the enterprise and rental space within St. Petersburg. Maybe it's all about rental space and neighbor relations?

INSTEAD OF CONCLUSION

As my small investigation showed, a whole group of “friendly” people, perhaps taking advantage of the boundless trust of the already mentioned top manager of Gazprom Mezhregiongaz LLC N.P. Konovalenko, has been “withdrawing” hundreds of millions of dollars from Gazprom for several years now - and not without success. Meanwhile, the gas monopolist himself constantly complains about the lack of money and increases gas prices by 10–15% every year. Over the past five years, the cost of gas for the population has doubled and continues to grow. And as long as Gazprom continues to tolerate such holes in its budget, the trend is unlikely to change.