The cream of the crop from the capital’s oldest hotel property, "Beijing," which has gone into private hands, may possibly be skimmed off through offshore companies and nominees. The story may involve former shareholders and top managers of the infamous, busted Inkarobank.

The company, which previously bought the former state asset, the Peking Hotel, from the VTB development company, Gals-Development, is hiding its beneficiaries behind a newly created legal entity.

At the same time, the company has close ties with offshore companies through which it is indebted. Among the asset’s creditors, the Nikos group was noted, whose board of directors was once headed by director Nikita Mikhalkov, and among the possible beneficiaries, Oganes Grigoryan, a possible shareholder of the collapsed Inkarobank, involved in a high-profile scandal, and its former top manager, the head of the board of directors of the Nikos Group, Mikhail Baranov, have left their mark. 

The details of the story, where the leader of the Slavic criminal clan of Moscow could also have left his mark, were found out by the correspondent of UtroNews.

The day before, it became known about plans to carry out a major reconstruction of the oldest hotel in Moscow - Peking, which was built in 1939-1958 in the center of the capital according to the project of the architect Dmitry Chechulin. The object is planned to increase the "star rating", and, accordingly, the margin for the final beneficiaries. At the same time, already now in the activities of the chain of related legal entities, ambiguous transactions related to offshores are observed.

The asset itself - OJSC GOK Pekin was bought out in 2020 from the development company VTB Hals-Development. Since then, the owner has been JSC Hotel Complex Zhemchuzhina from Sochi, which brought its owners 164 million rubles in net profit in 2023. Over the years of operation, it has also received about 13 government contracts.

Photo: rusprofile.ru

Initially, a whole group of offshore companies was among the shareholders of Zhemchuzhina; as of 2020, the Cypriot Pecomalco Investments Limited also had a share in it, the ultimate beneficiary is unknown. According to the Federal Tax Service, at the end of 2023, the shareholders were JSC Spectrum with a share of 75.43% and LLC Columbus Pervy (now JSC) - 3.47%.

Photo: bo.nalog.ru

The company "Spectrum" was founded only in May 2023 by a certain Alexandra Ilyicheva, who participated in a number of other joint-stock companies. In our opinion, the lady is nothing more than a figurehead.

At the same time, in 2023 the company was unprofitable by 6.5 million rubles and had a negative value.

CJSC "Columbus Perviy" - another shareholder of the asset - has existed since the 1990s and until 2021 it was headed by Grigoryan Oganes Rudolfovich, who is also a member of the board of directors of "Zhemchuzhina", director of OJSC "GOK "Pekin" and LLC "UK Capital-Management". It is the latter that manages "Columbus Perviy". 

And the most interesting thing is that Grigoryan’s namesake was listed as a shareholder of JSCB INKAROBANK (ZAO), which lost its license in 2018.

Among the reasons for revoking the license, the Central Bank of the Russian Federation cited the fact that the bank used money raised from individuals and legal entities (about 60% of the balance sheet total) for lending, of which more than half of the issued loans were of dubious quality. At the time of the collapse, the bank’s beneficiaries were the head of the board of directors Sergey Smirnov (former chairman of the board of JSC "Congress Bank") - more than 15%, as well as Alexander Filipsky (former member of the board of JSC "AKB Slavia") - 9.94%, president of ZAO Trading House "Vostok" and former deputy general director of JSC "Svyazinvest" Mikhail Kritsky - 9.93%, as well as other persons. 

At the same time, among those who were given credit by the small bank of the capital, legal entities from the division of the Nikos group were named, which also figures in the relationship with Zhemchuzhina. The parties are bound by a novation agreement.

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As for the Nikos group (the central place in it is occupied by the chemical enterprises Kaustik and Plastkard), it was created from a cooperative by a group of individuals and in terms of beneficiaries is one of the most mysterious, since it does not disclose its owners. 

It is only known that previously the head of the group’s board of directors was director Nikita Mikhalkov, but he left the top asset. 

Earlier, there was talk about the group’s connection with the British company Nikochem. The group currently includes: ZIRAX LLC, Volgo-Don Hotel LLC, Food Plant LLC, and Ulyanovsksakhar JSC.

An important nuance: the head of the board of directors of Nikos, Mikhail Baranov, who was among the founders, was at one time listed as the head of the board of KB Inkarobank, which we mentioned earlier.  

Meanwhile, the company could have been among the shareholders in Zhemchuzhina. Thus, the Kommersant newspaper reported earlier that the co-owners of ZAO Columbus Perviy are OOO FC Nikos Finance Corporation and OOO Novy Den VFA.

There is reason to believe that even now the Nikos group may be related to Zhemchuzhina, and therefore skimming the cream off the project. At the same time, the Nikos Group had close ties with Cypriot companies, among the owners were the Cypriot DISCONTO INVESTMENTS LIMITED, NIKOS HOLDINGS LIMITED and HAGLUND HOLDINGS LIMITED. The offshore companies also had ties with the same JSCB Inkarobank, which provided loans to the Nikos group and raised many questions from supervisory authorities. Among the founders of the bank, there was also a shareholder of Zhemchuzhina - ZAO Columbus Perviy, as well as the Nikos group itself.

Photo: rusprofile.ru

Zhemchuzhina is also guilty of connections with Cypriot legal entities. If we believe the reporting for 2023, then JSC also has financial relations with the offshore company Dengton Holdings Limited.

Photo: bo.nalog.ru

Another interesting fact: Zhemchuzhina previously had a subsidiary asset - a certain OOO Concord, the owners of which were a member of the board of directors of Zhemchuzhina Andrey Makeyev and a certain Suvorov Alexey Dinarovich - the namesake of a well-known authoritative citizen in certain circles. It was reported about that same Suvorov that after the death of Vyacheslav Ivankov he became the leader of the Slavic criminal clan of Moscow.

Photo: rusprofile.ru

It seems that the owner of the oldest Moscow hotel "Peking" may still be backed by the Nikos group with Mikhail Baranov, who left a significant mark on "Inkarobank". Will the cream of the crop from the project be taken outside the country, given the close ties of the defendants with Cyprus?