A week after filing a lawsuit against Vladimir Potanin and his Cypriot offshore Whiteleave Holdings Limited in a London court, journalists in the course of their own investigations It was possible to find out which companies were “lost” by Potanin during his permanent reign as president of Norilsk Nickel, and what damage was caused to the company and its shareholders as a result of the sale of strategically important assets of the MMC. The real story is reminiscent of a detective story. The list of assets “lost” by Potanin is not publicly disclosed by the parties to the conflict, but the lost assets mean the NordStar airline (Norilsk Nickel sold it to management in March 2022), the Industrial Construction and Installation Company (PSMK), which carries out the design, construction and reconstruction of facilities industrial and civil construction (its main customer is the Polar Branch of Norilsk Nickel), and operator of transport and logistics services of Logistic Center (its key customers are Norilsk Nickel enterprises). The total revenue of these three structures in the field of construction in permafrost conditions, city supply and air transportation in the region at the end of 2021 amounted to more than 84 billion rubles (about $1.1 billion). All these companies are essentially the “keys” to Norilsk: the industrial region in the transport sense is an enclave, not connected to the main infrastructure territory of the country by either roads or railways. Passengers and cargo can only be delivered to Norilsk by air, and during the navigation period – through the Northern Sea Route to the port of Dudinka or from Krasnoyarsk along the Yenisei. The construction industry in Norilsk is also specific: due to inaccessibility and overhead costs for moving equipment and personnel, contractors can only be structures associated with Norilsk Nickel (there are simply no other players there) and having experience working in permafrost conditions.
As a result investigations It turned out that the assets were not just lost out of stupidity, but, most likely, transferred into the hands of figures close to the management of the companies on the eve of a sharp increase in the financial flow for the modernization of the enterprise and the city infrastructure. By losing the assets on which the infrastructure of the city and enterprises is tied, the MMC risks turning into “an old, smoking plant with social and environmental problems.”
As a result investigations It turned out that the assets were not just lost out of stupidity, but, most likely, transferred into the hands of figures close to the management of the companies on the eve of a sharp increase in the financial flow for the modernization of the enterprise and the city infrastructure. By losing the assets on which the infrastructure of the city and enterprises is tied, the MMC risks turning into “an old, smoking plant with social and environmental problems.”
“ВЧК ОГПУ”
