Abramovich dodged millions of people with super-for-hire scheme

Roman Abramovich was Christmas in 2011, a year after his new supertches, delivery of Aclips. But it seems that it would not have been using it during the period of Oligurk festival – records suggest that it was chartered by a company located in the British Virgin Islands.

And yet the pictures of the Christmas day shows Mr. Abramovich in Caribbean Sunshine that year, who stand on the floating stage behind the boat, with the big letters of Aclips with the big letter-E logo behind it.

Such charter recorded a decade -long plan to mislead the authorities by recording such charters, now exposed in investigation by BBC and The. Investigation Journalism Bureau,

The scheme presented the fleet of the Russian elite as a commercial lease operation to the fleet of boats, to dodge millions of euros in VAT at their purchase and walking cost.

“Tax is stolen,” Italian tax lawyer and professor Tomaso de Tanno told the BBC. “This is a criminal.”

In a statement, Mr. Abramovich’s lawyer – who now allegedly divides his time between Istanbul, Tel Aviv and Sochi’s Russian resort – said he said “always had received free experts professional and got legal advice” and Working accordingly “.

In March 2022, a billionaire approved by the UK in March 2022, on his connection with Vladimir Putin, bought five luxury boats during the 2000s, which were involved in the tax plan.

Of them was 115 meters (377 ft) Pelorus, which he allegedly lended to Chelsea footballer John Terry for his honeymoon in 2007 – and eclipse, which once the largest private in the world at 162.5 m (533 ft) The boat was and an estimated $ 700 meters was estimated. (£ 559m).

Planning to dodge tax on boats – and other mysteries of the corporate empire of the approved Oligark have been kept bare in over 400,000 files and 72,000 emails have been leaked from a Cyprint Corporate Services Provider, Meritrivas.

They show how Meriterservus administered the Oligark’s businesses through a global network of companies that were owned by companies owned by a series of trusts, of which Mr. Abramovich was beneficiaries.

The BBC and its media partners are reporting on leaked files from 2023, which are part of the International Union of investigative journalists. Cyprus confidantial Investigation. We revealed earlier One of the closest colleagues of Mr. Putin, the financial link of Mr. AbramovichAccused of possessing the property of the President.

Files show how the advisors of Mr. Abramovich helped them to avoid paying heavy tax bills at the ongoing cost of boats in the European Union water, which work to control the companies themselves or other companies They used to control them by keeping them.

Documents show how five boats were called Blue Ocean Yacht Management to a company of Cyprus, which he had charged a handful of companies in the British Virgin Islands that appeared free – but who really by Mr. Abramovich Were controlled.

The plan to dodge VAT in Cyprus was revealed in the 2005 memorandum on the “operating structure” proposed to manage the boats of Shri Abramovich.

The author of the Memo, Jonathan Holowe said, “We want to avoid paying VAT at the purchase price of boats and where it is possible to avoid paying VAT on goods and services provided to Yats.”

• can you hear File on 4 investigation: Abramovich, boat and tax dodge BBC Radio 4 on Tuesday 28 January 20:00 pm and Wednesday 29 January 11:00 pm – or BBC feels

Although companies hiring the blue ocean and boats were owned by all the trusts of Shri Abramovich, their intention was to appear to appear as unconfirmed “so that an investigator examining our operation would see it as a valid structure”, Mr. Holowway Had sent to the memo. Some close aide of Shri Abramovich.

Mr. Holowway warned him that he should be “aware of risks”. He wrote: “We all have to identify that a fixed investigator can eventually find out that it is an in-house structure with possible results that will enter.”

Mr. Holowway has written that Blue Ocean, companies that had leased boats, and the ultimate “customer” should not have the same shareholder, directors or registered addresses, to avoid any “general link” Can

As Memo mentions, Mr. Abramovich’s lawyer agreed to put the ownership of the blue ocean completely in a completely separate trust – apparently to remove it from other companies.

Certainly, the ownership of Yacht Management Company Blue Ocean was later transferred from the main trust of Oligark to a new, Neptune Trust.

The way Mr. Abramovich’s companies leased each other to the boats, Prof. Tanno told the BBC, a “artificial structure” that extended the tax – a criminal offense.

“My conclusion is that in the case, a tax is stolen … because all the parties know what to do really to hide the reality,” he said.

Tax expert Rita de La Feria told the BBC that he saw in the boat scheme “Sanket” that they could offer information wrongly “.

“If so, we are now under the ambit of theft,” he said.

Mr. Holowway, who stepped as a director of Blue Ocean about 15 years ago, told the BBC that he had “joined Blue Ocean 20 years ago and was for a relatively short time”.

He said that he had “literally managed hundreds of ships from many different places around the world”. “I cannot be expected to remember the personal circumstances of every ship I have ever managed,” he said.

The lawyers representing Mr. Abramovich told the BBC that “he denied any allegation that he had any knowledge” or “personally responsible” or “was responsible for any alleged deception of any government authority”.

His lawyers said that the way Mr. Abramovich sought professional legal and tax advice and took action on it, he hopes that “a similar advice was sought by those people on a relevant time, one of which one day-day running running The responsibility was for the “Companies of Companies” scheme.

If it was a real supertatch on lease trading, sufficient profit could be expected. However, the accounts of Blue Ocean show that from 2005 to 2012, its expenses almost matched its income.

This meant that almost no corporation was taxed as the company’s profit was small.

A note by the Blue Ocean Director suggests that a close matching of expenses and income was not an accident and when the plan requires a plan to cover the expenses, the company will generate charters.

“At the beginning of every week we will have a meeting in the blue ocean where we will look at our current bank balance and our cash needs for the next 1 ~ 2 weeks. If we see the need for cash injection a suitable Take time charter and invoices, “he wrote.

The leaked files also have evidence that the charter agreements were backdated. It signed a time charter agreement by Blue Ocean in July 2005 and another Abramovich Company in BVI called IK Services. However, records suggest that eyeke services were not present at that point – it was not included until a month.

In another case, a director of Blue Ocean requested the production of a backdate and signed time charter to get the delivery of Duty -Fuel for 86 meters (282ft) yacht Estacia of Mr. Abramovich – which requested the production of 15 in the eight suites The guests can adjust – the billionaire in tax can save $ 44,000 (£ 35,000).

In documents, the tax advisors of Deloite in Cyprus wrote to the Director of Blue Ocean, Mr. Holowe, saying that if the ships were joyful ships, they would have to pay VAT. But if the vessels were classified as commercial, they will not.

Benjamin Maltbi, a leading supert that of the BBC, told the BBC that the types of contracts used for many luxury yacht charters of Mr. Abramovich were actually designed for commercial ships carrying dried cargo such as grains or steel.

This gives us more evidence that the entire commercial “look” of the operation was a sham.

Mr. Abramovich’s supertches scheme came twice under a legal investigation, with different levels of success, the BBC and the Bureau of Investigative Journalism have learned.

Richard Bridge captained two boats of Sri Abramovich for nearly six years from 2006 to 2012, including the pride of the fleet of Pelorus, and the huge eclipse, Abramovich’s fleet. A few years after working for Mr. Abramovich, the captain was stopped and questioned at Shipol Airport in Amsterdam.

Italian prosecutors initiated proceedings against three of the three captains of Shri Abramovich – including Mr. Bridge – for fuel filling and unpaid excise on tax evasion.

But Mr. Bridge told the BBC that he had approached Blue Ocean and “his lawyers climbed on it”, a few months later he was demolished.

After proving the Documents manufactured by lawyers, the records of the Italian court recorded by the BBC show proceedings were recorded as a commercial boat in the registers, as its use was used for commercial purposes or for rent ” Was done.

Shri Bridge said that he was unknown, Mr. Abramovich also controlled companies who were charter to boats.

In Cyprus, tax officials were investigating individual blue oceans, which were disputed in unpaid VAT to € 17M (£ 14.3m), disputed the company’s claim to be “zero-rated” for VAT because It was a commercial operation.

Blue Ocean lawyers said that ships were used commercially from the demands of providing evidence, which were “inappropriate and oppressive” by companies that were chartered by companies, but they asked their customers anyway and no one else The response was not received.

Now we know that the customers of Blue Ocean were definitely other companies of Mr. Abramovich.

According to an appeal decision in 2018, VAT investigators found that Blue Ocean had failed to present any evidence, which was “engaged in economic activity” to the charters of boats and claim that boats It was used for commercial purposes.

Finally, Cyprus pursued the blue ocean for a lower figure of € 14m (£ 11.8m).

We do not know what the amount was paid – the company failed to participate in its own appeal in March 2024 and was dissolved four months later.

Cyprus confidantial The Cyprus firms have an international partner initiated in 2023 led by the International Consortium of Investigative Journalists (ICIJ), which provided corporate and financial services to the allies of Russian President Vladimir Putin’s rule.

Media partners include Guardian, Investigative News Room Paper Trail Media, Italian newspaper L’ESPRESSO, The Organized Crime and Corruption Reporting Project (OCCRP) and the Bureau of Investigative Journalism (TBIJ).