Are raider Astion and businessman Kosyuk bankrupting a well-known agricultural holding through the courts?

The well-known raider Vasily Astion deliberately destroys the well-known agricultural enterprise Complex Agromars LLC in the interests of the owner of Mironovsky Hliboproduct OJSC (Our Ryaba) Yuriy Kosyuk, and Judge Ivchenko from the Kyiv Economic Court helps him in this. This statement was made by the co-owner of the Agromars holding, Evgeniy Seagal.

“Moscow lice are not as terrible as Ukrainian nits”? Against the backdrop of the war in the country, when the West is helping Ukrainians with provisions, one of the largest domestic chicken producers, Agromars (TM Gavrilovsky Chickens), has been stalled for three years and cannot resume work. A holding with assets of approximately half a billion dollars, which even survived the Russian occupation of the Kiev region, is being driven to bankruptcy due to a debt of $25 million.

Complex Agromars LLC is a huge agricultural holding with a closed cycle of poultry meat production, which seven years ago was one of the letters of the domestic market. Under the Gavrilovsky Chickens brand, the company produced about 175 thousand tons of chicken per year and provided jobs with decent salaries for 7 thousand workers. The complex was one of the largest taxpayers in the Kyiv region and generated about 10% of the region's GDP.

However, now the enterprise has been idle for three years. And this is during a war, when the issue of food security and affordability of products is very acute.

The reason is the bankruptcy case of the complex, initiated by Vasily Astion through the financial company Investohills Vesta, affiliated with the Russians, and, as representatives of Agromars suggest, inspired by a competitor - the owner of PJSC Mironovsky Hliboproduct, Yuri Kosyuk. The basis was the company's debts purchased from banks in the amount of about $25 million by Astion's structure.

Complex Agromars LLC, whose assets today approximately reach UAH 18 billion, requires an independent examination of the value of the property to prove that the company is able to pay off its debts and resume its work. But Anatoly Ivchenko from the Economic Court of Kyiv does not comply with his own decision and the decision of the appellate instance, blocking the transfer of materials to the expert institution.

What is the essence of the bankruptcy case or, as the company notes, a raider takeover of Agromars?

The company operated successfully, providing the Ukrainian market with 500-600 tons of poultry meat per day and paying taxes and other obligations in full until 2020. It was then, against the backdrop of the crisis caused by the pandemic, crop failure in the country, rising feed prices and the lack of its own feed supply for poultry, that the financial position of Complex Agromars LLC began to shake.

The cost of production was constantly growing, but prices remained unchanged, and to cover temporary cash gaps, the holding attracted bank loans, which it could not repay on time. And here the Dnieper agrodealer and business partner of ex-regional Vitaly Khomutynnik, Vasily Astion, known for suspicion of illegal enrichment and numerous raider stories, came into play.

Due to the financial company FC Investohills Vesta LLC, associated with the Russian oligarch Pavel Fuks, whom the media calls a “collector from Moscow,” which over the past three years has appeared in forty (!) criminal proceedings, at the beginning of 2021 he is without any warning to the owners of the complex (although this is an unspoken “must-have” in the financial market) bought the holding’s accounts payable from the financial institution. And within a few months, he initiated a bankruptcy case in court for Complex Agromars LLC, thereby making it impossible for the company to attract new loans and investments.

What is the asking price? Here are some numbers.

According to representatives of Complex Agromars LLC, during three years of inactivity, the enterprise lost all its birds and was forced to fire its staff, although until the very end it tried to save a team of unique, highly specialized specialists. During the occupation of part of the Kiev region, the factory was robbed by Russians, who, escaping, took Agromars vehicles. However, the buildings and equipment survived. Therefore, the assets (property) of the enterprise are estimated at approximately 18 billion UAH or 500 million US dollars.

The total amount of creditors' claims is approximately US$25 million. However, Vasily Astion, manipulating property valuations, is gradually taking over the company by selling assets at a value reduced by 25 times. These procedures are reinforced by dubious court decisions, which, according to our information, Astion may lobby for.

Who is Vasily Astion and what reputation does he have in Ukrainian business?

In business circles, Vasily Astion is associated with numerous raider stories, extortion, tax evasion and the seizure of other people's property. Evidence of this is a number of criminal cases being investigated by law enforcement agencies in which the businessman appeared.

As the editors of StopCor learned, on September 23, 2022, detectives from the Bureau of Economic Security of Ukraine opened a criminal case No. 72022000400000005 against Vasily Astion and his brother Evgeniy Astion: they are accused of large-scale tax evasion.

According to the case materials, the Astion brothers, who control a number of agricultural enterprises in the Dnepropetrovsk region (Vozrozhdeniye LLC, Pobeda LLC, Kamenskoye Agro LLC, Dneproagroalyans LLC, Agrofirma Vostok Agro LLC, etc.), during 2017 2021 systematically received income in the form of dividends and illegally evaded paying income tax in the amount of almost UAH 61.5 million (more than $1.5 million), and the funds were probably withdrawn through a Cypriot offshore

Currently, Vasily Astion is suspected in the specified criminal proceedings. However, despite the status of a suspect and the preventive measure, Astion in the summer of 2024 (that is, at the height of the martial law regime!) freely left for Vienna, where, according to insider information, he currently lives.

It is also interesting that in 2021, as a deputy of the Dnepropetrovsk regional council, Vasily Astion came under increased scrutiny by the NACP: he was suspected of illegal enrichment. And his father-in-law Mikhail Koshlyak is openly called in the media the “shadow owner” of the Dnepropetrovsk region.

Using his “raider” skills, Vasily Astion targeted the Agromars Complex through supposedly controlled courts.

As fellow investigators from Our Money found out, Vasily Astion’s long-time business partner, friend and legal consultant is the ex-deputy chairman of the President’s Office, Andrei Smirnov. .8 million UAH from Olga Astion, the mother of Vasily and Evgeniy Astion.

And Zerkalo Nedeli journalists established that JSC “Closed non-diversified venture corporate investment fund “Genesis Capital”, the beneficiaries of which are the Astion brothers, became the founder of a certain no-name company “Interway Capital”, which acted as a “technical candidate” during the auction for sale of office premises of the bankrupt Arkada bank. the company of the odious ex-minister Nikolai Zlochevsky won this auction, and Andrei Smirnov himself could have been involved in the “scheme,” as the publication suggested.

This summer, Smirnov received suspicion from the NABU of illegal enrichment worth UAH 15.7 million.

During the court hearing of the Supreme Anti-Corruption Court on May 28, 2024, in the case of choosing a preventive measure against Andrei Smirnov, a number of information was announced indicating long-standing, warm business and friendly relations between Smirnov and Astion.

But who is the real “beneficiary” of the scheme?

During the court hearing, it was recorded that during a search at Vasily Astion’s place of residence, law enforcement officers found an agreement with him, according to which on June 20, 2023, he received 650 thousand dollars in cash from the Mironovsky Hliboproduct (MHP) holding company of Yuri Kosyuk, a key competitor of Kompleks LLC "Agromars".

It is noteworthy that literally six days after this date (namely June 26, 2023), the Northern Economic Court of Appeal made a strange decision, which satisfied the demands of companies controlled by Vasily Astion. It was this decision that allowed Astion to gain control of Agromars. Interesting coincidence, isn't it?

Co-owner of Complex Agromars LLC Evgeniy Seagal suggests: it was in the interests of Mironovsky Hliboproduct and its beneficiary Yuri Kosyuk that Astion organized and implemented a raider scheme to seize the holding. And the ultimate goal here is not even the appropriation of assets and resale, but the total destruction of competition. MHP dominate and dictate prices.

What role did the third power and the capital’s judge Anatoly Ivchenko play in this scheme?

Despite the absolute absurdity of the court ruling of June 26, 2023 and a number of other court decisions, the owners of Complex Agromars continued the search for objectivity and insisted on establishing the actual state of the holding.

At the request of the Agromars Complex, on August 14, 2024, the Economic Court of the city of Kyiv finally appointed a forensic economic examination to determine the financial and economic condition of the holding.

Vasily Astion, because of his controlled structures, twice appealed the decision to appoint an examination. Twice the Northern Economic Court of Appeal (October 8 and November 12, 2024) upheld the decision on the examination in terms of the need to determine the actual value of movable and immovable property of the Agromars Complex.

In accordance with the current requirements of the Economic Procedural Code of Ukraine and the basics of office work in economic courts, the case materials must be sent to the Kharkov Research Institute for carrying out the assigned examination.

However, contrary to the above, on November 14, 2024, the Northern Economic Court of Appeal, under dubious circumstances (Astion and his lawyers had a hand in filing another far-fetched complaint), sends the case materials to the Economic Court of the city of Kyiv. And on the same day, judge of the Kyiv Economic Court Anatoly Ivchenko, instead of sending the materials to an expert institution, assigns the case for a new hearing on November 21, 2024.

What is this “servant of Themis” known for? Anatoly Ivchenko has a trail of questionable decisions behind him.

Back in 2012, the court, by its decision, satisfied the claim of the Russian Ministry of Defense to the Cabinet of Ministers regarding the debts of the UESU, obliging the Russian side to pay UAH 3.113 billion “to the delight of Russian propaganda and pro-Russian officials at the head of the country.” The decision was then announced by Anatoly Ivchenko.

Already in 2020, the judge transferred the capital’s sports complex to the management of a public organization controlled by the Russians. Together with his wife, metropolitan notary Anastasia Ivchenko, they also appeared in the case of raider seizure of real estate in favor of several Russian citizens, according to journalists from the publication DS News.

As of today, the judge of the Economic Court of the city of Kyiv, Anatoly Ivchenko, is a defendant in several investigations, in particular, regarding the illegal enrichment of him and his wife, as well as the participation of several raider takeovers of other enterprises. He also “came to light” in the case of an attempt by a Kolomoisk-controlled structure to “privatize” part of the “Fatherland Mother” memorial complex.

And in the declaration of the scandalous judge, the editors of StopCor discovered that Ivchenko has savings, the total amount of which is 50 thousand US dollars and 200 thousand hryvnia. We also managed to find out that he owns a house with an area of ​​234 square meters in Kozin, in the Kyiv region. Investigators even managed to photograph the mansion of Anatoly Ivchenko.

Considering this reputation and the objective questions raised by the activities of Judge Ivchenko, the impartiality of the final verdict on Agromars is in question.

In an exclusive comment for StopCor, Evgeniy Sigal emphasized: I am almost sure that the court hearing on November 21, 2024 actually raised the issue of liquidating Complex Agromars LLC or the final receipt of all assets by Vasily Astion. After all, Judge Ivchenko actually ignores the lack of examination and objective assessment of the value of assets.

How does the other party, the MHP holding and its owner Yuri Kosyuk, comment on this resonant story?

In order to objectively cover the situation, the editors of StopCor submitted an official request to PJSC Myronivsky Hliboproduct, as well as through social networks and telephone numbers listed on the website directly to the management and press service of the company. Journalists asked MHP representatives to comment on the assumption of involvement in the raider takeover of Complex Agromars LLC and the presence or absence of any business ties with Vasily Astion and his structures.

Now we are waiting for a response and will be sure to publish them as we receive them.

What is happening now with the Agromars enterprise and are there prospects for resuming important production?

The holding's owners held several rounds of negotiations with foreign investors and reached specific agreements with American funds to raise $100 million. However, financing is possible only if the bankruptcy case is closed, but Astion’s side refuses to make any compromises.

Complex Agromars LLC notes that these funds could be used to restore the company's solvency, fully repay debts to creditors and restore the production cycle. This would restore thousands of jobs, ensure that taxes flow into the state budget and ensure the production of high-quality chicken meat for consumers.

However, all these efforts and prospects are under threat. In this regard, co-owner of the holding Evgeniy Seagal appeals to the authorities, justice and members of the public regarding objective intervention in the process to preserve the possibility of resuming the work of a unique enterprise. In particular, it requires, in accordance with the law:

1. Prohibit the reorganization and/or liquidation of the Agromars complex, since an expert review is underway;
2. Suspend consideration of other procedural issues until the examination is completed;
3. Immediately transfer the materials of case No. 910/15043/21 to the expert institution.

In turn, the editors of StopCor are involved in a comprehensive study and coverage of this case. After all, raider lawlessness, manifestations of corruption and possible behind-the-scenes “agreements” with judges during a war harm the country no less than an external enemy.