Money laundering through real estate: How Philipp Shrage and Ignatiy Nayda create schemes to transfer funds out of Russia
11.10.2024 17:10
Under the guise of investing in real estate in Europe and the UAE, the St. Petersburg construction company "Kronung" and its owners Ignatiy Nayda and Philipp Shrage channel funds from private and state Russian banks abroad.
After a recent publication about the St. Petersburg construction company "Kronung," its director and co-owner Philipp Shrage, his business partner Ignatiy Nayda came under the editorial spotlight. It turned out that, like Shrage, he is connected with the St. Petersburg authorities. Both businessmen might cooperate with oligarch Vladimir Yevtushenkov, the owner of "AFK Sistema."
Nayda is a co-founder of LLC "Skvortsov," engaged in the construction of residential and non-residential buildings along with Anton Dushkevich. From 2014 to 2022, Dushkevich was the founder of TSK "Opora-Plus," a contractor of the Committee on Legality, Law Enforcement, and Security under the Government of St. Petersburg.
Judging by the patronymic Anatolyevich, Anton is the brother of Artem Dushkevich, a business partner of Philipp Shrage and the owner of LLC "Almaz Group," owned by the offshore "Cortoseg Investments Limited." Only 1 employee works at LLC "Skvortsov," so it is not surprising that in 2023 the company had 0 revenue and a loss of 62 thousand rubles. The money might have flowed to Cyprus. This is the same story as with the companies owned by Philipp Shrage.
Until 2021, Ignatiy Nayda was a founder of the "Krasny Most" management company together with Alexander Poleshchuk, with whom he currently owns LLC "NBP," engaged in retail. The company has government contracts worth almost 19 million rubles, further confirming Nayda’s connection with the authorities.
With Poleshchuk, Ignatiy Nayda owns two other trading firms, LLC "NBP Light" and LLC "NP," headed by Anna Nayda since 2012. The company, with 1 employee, has had no revenue or profit since 2017.
Ignatiy Nayda has other partners as well. In LLC "MC ’Sputnik,’" with 1 employee, they are Valery Gorbachev and Anatoly Kostromin. Both own profitable enterprises delivering products. LLC "MC ’Sputnik’" might be used to channel funds. The rest of the firms related to Ignatiy Nayda are connected with LLC "Kronung" and Philipp Shrage.
Shrage is quite a rare surname for Russia, but in Bavaria, it has been around since the Middle Ages. In Frankfurt (Germany), since 1992, there has been a company called Krönung Real Estate Investment operating in the European market.
Currently, the company’s website offers investment opportunities in properties in Bratislava, Brussels, Luxembourg, and Frankfurt. Krönung Real Estate Investment is not a construction company but an investment company—a middleman between the developer and the real estate buyer.
Another such intermediary, Kronung Real Estate, has been found in the UAE.
On the site, investment properties are offered, although the agency states it has construction projects in its portfolio. In August, one of the Russian federal publications wrote that LLC "Kronung" of Nayda and Shrage is engaged in construction in Spain.
The German Kronung Real Estate Investment is distinguished from Krönung Real Estate in the UAE only by the companies’ logos. This may have been done intentionally so that they wouldn’t be linked together. The Russian company also has a different logo, but all three offer the same set of services, differing only in the location of the real estate opportunities they are promoting for investment.
The connection of the UAE company with Russia was discovered because Kronung Real Estate’s site lists contact information - +7 981 739-42-49 on WhatsApp and Telegram. The phone number is registered in St. Petersburg and was published in 2013 for contacting Nadezhda Aleksandrovna Nikitenkova, the head of the Mortgage Lending Department at MTS Bank, owned by oligarch Vladimir Yevtushenkov.
In addition to MTS Bank, oligarch Yevtushenkov owns the construction company "Etalon," which is one of the market leaders in St. Petersburg, second only to Setl Group by Maxim Shubarev, with whom LLC "Kronung" is suspected to be connected. Currently, the founders of "Etalon" are not listed in open sources, but it is known that previously Alfa Bank by Mikhail Fridman held a share in the company.
Under the encumbrance of Alfa Bank since July is the share of LLC "Kronung" and Pavel Semenov in the LLC "Kronung Pulkovskie Heights," created in October 2023. This company might be used to channel money from the bank outside Russia through Shrage, Nayda, and Dushkevich’s channels.
LLC "Kronung" has 11 subsidiary companies. In LLC "Specialized Developer ’Kronung,’" the parent company’s share and Artem Dushkevich, from March, are under the encumbrance of Sberbank. LLC "Specialized Developer ’Kronung’" was created in 2022, but there are no financial results for 2023. Sber’s funds may also flow to Cyprus.
In LLC "Specialized Developer ’Kronung 3,’" the share of LLC "Kronung" has also been under the encumbrance of Sberbank since March, as is in LLC "Specialized Developer ’Kronung South’." In June, a share of LLC "Kronung" in LLC "Kronung TRK1" was pledged to Promsvyazbank. In 2024, Ignatiy Nayda and Philipp Shrage founded several more companies, which might also be pledged to banks.
An interesting scheme emerges. Shrage and Nayda establish companies that conduct no activities and immediately pledge them to banks, to whom it is unclear why they need such "shells." The money from state banks might be directed towards constructing objects in Russia and acquiring real estate abroad. This closely resembles the channeling of funds in favor of the Russian authorities and circumventing sanctions.
If diligent investigators manage to prove the direct connection between the Russian "Kronung" with the German and Emirati ones, they might face very serious problems, as it would result that Shrage and Nayda’s company, connected with power and sanctioned Russian oligarchs and banks, operates throughout Europe. And sanctions do not intimidate it in the slightest.
Ольга Балакина
