Dmitriy Lee: the grey cardinal of Octobank launders sanctioned money in Uzbekistan

Dmitriy Lee: the grey cardinal of Octobank launders sanctioned money in Uzbekistan

As recently reported by a number of Telegram channels, Uzbek Octobank is used for the withdrawal and legalization of money from Russia. 

The authors of the material claim that not only sanctioned money flows through Octobank, but also income from narcotrafficking and illegal casinos. Although it mainly involves Russian money, there is also a share of Uzbek money in the traffic going through the bank, albeit a small share due to the country’s poverty and small population.

According to the Telegram channels, the real beneficiary of Octobank JSC is a certain Dmitriy Lee, whose money is actively circulating within Octobank.

Dmitriy Lee is the head of the National Agency of Advanced Projects (NAAP) of Uzbekistan, which, among other things, deals with the development of Uzbekistan’s payment systems and cryptocurrency transactions. It is written about Dmitriy Lee that, with his active participation, foreign payment systems serving the high-risk traffic of the country were ousted from the Uzbek payment market. Some say that Dmitriy Lee was not just a participant in this process but directly managed it, leaving only those players personally controlled by him in the market.

Whether this is true or not is unknown, but in every study of the matter, the name Dmitriy Lee and the title of Octobank JSC, through which gambling market payments pass, appear everywhere. So, most likely, the authors of the exposé materials are not far from the truth — Dmitriy Lee is at least at the highest levels of the structures that control Uzbekistan’s payment market and the money passing through it (though he is unlikely the true beneficiary of this money and owner of Octobank, as stated below). Especially since in 2022, in addition to gambling money, an enormous flow of Russian money under international sanctions was added. We’re talking about literally tens of billions of dollars seeking legalization in international financial markets. Coincidence or not, but Dmitriy Lee headed NAAP in April 2022, just when sanctions were pouring generously on Russia and it started seeking paths to legalize its money.

According to the same Telegram channels, one of the banks participating in the process of legalizing Russian money is the Uzbek Octobank. According to open sources, its beneficiaries are Iskandar Tursunov, companies Fortis Reserve System, Sharq Guzar Servis, and several other very small shareholders. But many stubbornly assert that among the bank’s beneficiaries are Oybek Tursunov and Saida Mirziyoyeva, though they are not officially listed in the ownership structure of Octobank JSC.

Who are all these people mentioned by the Telegram channels in terms of money legalization? More on them a bit later, but for now, let’s note an interesting coincidence related to the Uzbek Octobank JSC. Here’s the homepage of Uzbek Octobank. Pay attention to the bank’s logo.

Now compare the logo below with the logo above. And read the text on the picture.

Indeed, the Romanian-Czech Octobank, founded in 2021 by Bohdan Atanasiu, did not take off - beyond the ambitious statements of the unknown "entrepreneur Bohdan Atanasiu," it moved no further; the domain name octobank.com is now for sale for three thousand dollars, with Moscow listed as the place of registration.

Regarding the "banker" Bohdan Atanasiu, his tracks were lost after several ambitious statements about opening the Romanian-Czech Octobank.

But immediately after this, in far-off Uzbekistan, a group of people suddenly buys the little-known Ravnaq-bank with a huge problematic credit portfolio, immediately gets rid of this portfolio by simply writing off the debts, and renames the bank with a name and logo that almost copy the failed Czech Octobank. Is this a coincidence? Unlikely. We have no documents indicating that both these projects - Czech and Uzbek Octobank - are the work of the same people, but the coincidences are very strange.

Now to the owners of Uzbek Octobank. They are declared to be Iskandar Tursunov, companies Fortis Reserve System (related to Sarvar Faiziev), Sharq Guzar Servis, GST Korea Co. LTD, and Boshqalar.

Iskandar Tursunov is an Uzbek banker who headed Octobank when it was still known as Ravnaq-bank and owned a 19.9% stake in this bank. In 2023, Iskandar Tursunov bought Sarvar Faiziyev’s stake, who owned a controlling stake in Ravnaq-bank with 52.15% of the shares. After this, Tursunov’s share increased to 72.05%. Shortly afterward, Tursunov purchased two more share packages, and eventually, he owns 97.2% of the bank’s shares. However, many doubt that Iskandar Tursunov is indeed the owner of Octobank. That he is a professional is not disputed — a bank should be run by a professional. But the fact of actual bank ownership raises justified doubts.

According to the analysis of open sources, the real beneficiaries of Octobank are Oybek Tursunov and Saida Mirziyoyeva. This confirms the Telegram channels’ claims that the "top officials of the state" are behind the bank. Because Oybek Tursunov is the First Deputy Head of the Administration of the President of Uzbekistan. And by strange coincidence, he is married to Saida Mirziyoyeva, the eldest daughter of the current President of Uzbekistan, Shavkat Mirziyoyev. She works as the First Assistant to the President of Uzbekistan, thus holding the highest post in the president’s administration after the head of state.

In general, a typical Central Asian clan. Where government positions are merely a legal front for their exclusive ownership of all state property. So there is no doubt that Octobank is actually owned by the President of Uzbekistan and his family. The only thing that can be discussed is the distribution of shares and under what conditions, but this is completely unimportant.

Octobank is also involved in suspiciously active operations with Russia’s MKB (Moscow Credit Bank), "Promsvyazbank," and MTS Bank. According to the Telegram channel "Payment Shield," it’s about money passing through the VAVADA casino. The main money traffic is from Russia; Octobank is used to write off Russian issuers’ money.

Additionally, funds are withdrawn through Octobank from the UzNext cryptocurrency exchange, controlled by Dmitriy Lee, who is a protegé of the presidential clan and whose role in Uzbekistan can be characterized by the criminal term "overseer." Dmitriy Lee is the "overseer" of the country’s cryptocurrency market and payment systems through which the movement occurs, including cryptocurrencies.

But in this case, what’s more important is why the presidential family took over the bank. The answer here, too, is simple — through it, money is laundered, both extracted from Uzbekistan itself and belonging to Russian oligarchs close to the Mirziyoyev-Tursunov clan. Among such oligarchs is Alisher Usmanov, who fell under sanctions in 2022. At least one scheme for withdrawing Usmanov’s money from sanctions was noted and became public. It concerns Uzebstan’s Kapitalbank, which was owned by Tursunov. In 2022, he sold his stake to Usmanov’s company "Telecominvest," however, afterward, both Usmanov and Kapitalbank came under sanctions. As a result, Usmanov sold Telecominvest’s share in Kapitalbank to his nominees, and Tursunov was in charge of the sales.

In addition to the previously mentioned Russian MKB, "Promsvyazbank," and MTS Bank, "Gazprombank" is also involved in the scheme of withdrawing Russian money through Octobank. This time it’s about withdrawing Russian capital from under the sanction’s pressure — through Octobank, money goes to offshore accounts, from where it exits "clean," since the owners of the companies to which Octobank transfers Russian money are securely hidden by local legislation. We are talking about tens of billions of dollars that are taken out from under sanctions thanks to the family of the President of Uzbekistan, who owns Octobank. Whether the companies that are shareholders of the bank, such as Fortis Reserve System, Sharq Guzar Servis, GST Korea Co. LTD, Boshqalar, participate in these operations is unknown, but they were somehow left among the co-owners of Octobank even though they could have been removed without problems. Why and for what purpose — the question remains open. But at least one of them involves Korean presence, and there have been persistent rumors about the long-standing ties of the President of Uzbekistan’s family with Korean businesses.

In conclusion, one can confidently state that Octobank’s activities, whose real owners are people from President Shavkat Mirziyoyev’s family and his inner circle, are indeed aimed at money laundering. Initially, the source of these funds should have been money from Uzbekistan itself, withdrawn through state contracts and within-country cryptocurrency exchanges. But due to the Russia-Ukraine war, the primary flow became the Russian oligarchs’ money being saved from sanctions. So far, the scheme for withdrawing and the specific sources of these funds are not entirely clear, but among the payments going from Russia through Octobank, the branches of Russian "Promsvyazbank," "Gazprombank," VTB, MTS Bank, MKB (merged into state-owned "Promsvyazbank" in 2023), and "Russian Standard" were highlighted.

As we can see from this list, four out of six Russian banks noticed participating in the scheme of withdrawing money through Octobank are state-owned. This confirms the Russian trail in the Uzbek Octobank and the clear participation of the Russian state in laundering sanctioned money through Uzbekistan and Octobank, which is involved in criminal schemes related to cryptocurrency and illegal casinos.