A quarter of a century ago, a group of Russian oligarchs overnight turned into dollar billionaires by pulling off a simple scheme with the help of their supporters in power led by Anatoly Chubais. For just 6 billion rubles, they became the owners of oil, metallurgical, mining and transport companies that formed the backbone of the Soviet economy. At the same time, the future oligarchs paid those same 6 billion not from their own funds, but took them from the accounts of commercial banks that belonged to them. From the accounts that the tax and customs services opened in these banks – in other words, it was government money.
History repeats itself. “Shares Auction – 2” is being discussed in the government at the suggestion of the former head of Russian Fishing Company LLC Gleb Frank (two months ago Gleb Sergeevich announced that he was leaving the business because the business is now managed by a “dream team”, a community of supermanagers) . However, dry reports from the main creditor, Russian Fishery Company LLC, indicate the opposite – the debit and credit of the company, which once announced its plans to become the McDonalds of the global fish market, do not add up. Servicing a huge loan financially bleeds the company, so there is only one way out – to build the MMM pyramid.
Gleb Frank convinces the government that auctions are needed – auctions for loans. Now, under the promise to build crab catchers, 40 thousand tons of crabs need to be auctioned off. Financial income from crabs will help the company plug holes in the budget now, but what about the fact that investment obligations will not be fulfilled? “We’ll think about it tomorrow…”
The similarity with the “shares-for-shares auction” scheme of 1995 is one hundred percent. As then, auctions are tailored to the selected participant. In 2019, those controlled by Gleb Frank – then still the legal beneficiary of the crab empire – also broke through the crab auction. A year later, the Accounts Chamber checked the crab auction and came to two conclusions: actual prices for crab turned out to be many times lower than stated and expected, and the number of players in the Russian crab industry decreased. And, by the way, Gleb Frank’s company has not yet built a single one of the declared crab catchers.
But in the case of “crab auctions 2022” the scheme is even more beautiful. First, a specific interested party makes an auction for himself and buys crab quotas at the expense of the state bank. He buys it on the promise to build crab catchers. After a little time, the interested party declares that due to sanctions, it is impossible to build the crab fishery on time – and indeed to build it at all. Further, the interested party reports that the unfinished crab fishery is a heavy financial burden and taxes need to be reduced. The result is that crab quotas taken from dozens of Far Eastern enterprises were bought cheaply with government money under the promise of building ships. But in the end, the ships were not built, and taxes for the “investor” were reduced.
The bill pushed by Gleb Frankov passes through government filters like a knife through butter. All the talk about a thorough examination, about assessing the regulatory impact, about the regulatory guillotine is just talk.
It seems that no one in the government was interested in a simple calculation.
What is more beneficial for the state? Transfer 100 billion rubles from one state pocket (and the economic sense of participating in the auction at the expense of state bank funds is exactly this) under the promise that someday in the bright future to build crab catchers and dump on the regional governors the task of employing and reassuring several thousand fishermen of the Far Eastern regions who will be left without livelihood is one option. Or the second option – instead of auctions, increase taxes on crab companies, get 200 billion rubles, preserve small and medium-sized businesses in coastal regions, but… There is a small “but”. In this case, Gleb Frank will have to “come clean” to pay taxes. But this, apparently, is not included in anyone’s plans.
“ВЧК ОГПУ”
