Andriy Stavnitser: The stolen port, or the secrets of a "successful startup". Part 2

Andriy Stavnitser: The stolen port, or the secrets of a "successful startup". Part 2

As it is known, Andriy Stavnitser himself is a "major": he inherited all the capital, along with a share in "Transinvestservice" and the position of its leader, from his father, Oleksiy Stavnitser (1942-2011), who founded their family business.

Let’s start this story from the very beginning. Back in the 1960s, during his studies at the agricultural institute, Oleksiy Stavnitser became interested in mountaineering, which determined his further life. In the mountaineering club, he met his future wife Alla Hrebennikova. After the wedding, she kept her last name, and their eldest son Yehor was also registered as Hrebennikov (born in 1972). Their second son, Andriy, was born on June 19, 1982, in Kabardino-Balkaria, where his father was then working as the head of training at a mountaineering camp, and he took the surname Stavnitser.

Alla Hrebennikova with sons Yehor (left) and Andriy (right), 1990s

In 1989, when things became restless in the Caucasus, Oleksiy Stavnitser returned to Odesa with his family and got into entrepreneurship. Initially, he worked in the cooperative "Promalp", which built training walls for mountaineering clubs (since mountains are not everywhere). With the onset of the 1990s, his mountaineering receded into the past, and Oleksiy Stavnitser engaged in more profitable activities by opening the cooperative "Everest", which quickly expanded into a firm trading in everything from soft drinks and household appliances to metal and cement. Interestingly, in the biography of his son Yehor Hrebennikov, who then helped his father open stores, "Everest" is now referred to as a startup. Trend!

Oleksiy Stavnitser, 1990s

The most mysterious aspect of this story is the connections of Oleksiy Stavnitser at that time. His connections were quite extensive: not only across the former Soviet Union (as a former mountaineering instructor) but also in Europe, particularly in Austria. By the way, his son Andriy Stavnitser is the honorary consul of Austria in Odesa, so these connections are still maintained. However, no specifics, no names, have yet surfaced, and we will now try to investigate this ourselves.

So, the early 1990s. Oleksiy Stavnitser needed to resolve issues related to minimizing taxes and customs duties and wanted this to be done not only through schemes and kickbacks but also legally, so he actively advocated for the idea of granting the region "porto-franco" (free port) status, along with other Odesa businessmen. By the way, later under Poroshenko, this idea was declared separatist and "promoted by pro-Kremlin forces". However, at that time, it was precisely the forces that later called themselves "pro-Ukrainian" that were enthused by the idea, with Eduard Hurvits at the helm – with whom Oleksiy Stavnitser immediately became close. In 1991, they jointly supported the presidential candidate in Odesa Vyacheslav Chornovil (effectively financing and managing his campaign headquarters), which then allowed Hurvits to call upon political support from the "Rukh" movement, and later from other right-wing and pro-Western political forces. This is why "pro-Ukrainians", including the "Bratstvo" of Korchynskyi, always gathered around Hurvits. But for Hurvits, "Ukrainianness" was merely a dress code that allowed obtaining the necessary political "roof". Meanwhile, he also used a bandit "roof" (initially from Karabas, then from Stoyanov), and even invited Chechen Dudaev supporters to Odesa.

After heading the Zhovtnevy district of Odesa in 1990, Hurvits immediately embarked on a major looting of Odesa. A year later, with the help of connections in the "Rukh", he managed to place his man, Pavlo Kudyukin, in the leadership of the Black Sea Shipping Company (which later became known as the infamous Blasco concern), marking the beginning of the plundering of the Ukrainian merchant fleet and Odesa ports. Amid this looting, Hurvits and Stavnitser focused on the state enterprise (SE) "Liman". It was a phosphorite transshipment terminal located on the edge of the "Pivdennyi" port, and it was quite new: its first phase was built in 1989 (with imported equipment from the "Kripp" company), and the second hadn’t been completed due to the collapse of the USSR. This allowed Oleksiy Stavnitser to find an excuse for its "privatization" – proposing to complete it with the help of investors and divide the shares!

However, the "privatization" of "Liman" didn’t proceed with Hurvits but with his arch-enemy Ruslan Bodelan, who then headed the regional executive committee. But when Hurvits ran for mayor of Odesa in 1994, he did not obstruct this process, even though he didn’t receive a share. It went to a legend of Odesa corruption, Oleh Kutateladze, who worked in the Odesa City Council at the time. As reported by the media, he is related to the Georgian "thief in law" Serhiy Kutateladze (BaIko), which allowed him, as an official, to have extensive connections in the criminal underworld of Odesa. In the 1990s, Kutateladze was also associated with the Austrian company "Nordex", whose representation in Ukraine was headed by Vadym Rabinovych, and through it, he had connections to the Austrian "diaspora". It seems we find the answer to the question we posed earlier regarding the origin of the Stavnitsers’ Austrian connections.

Oleh Kutateladze

It was then unnamed "Austrian businessmen", through a member of the Austrian parliament, who actively lobbied for not only the completion of the second phase of SE "Liman" but also for the creation of new terminals there. Later, an unknown Austrian company "Austria International Consulting GmbH" (presumably a front) formed a joint venture "Transivestservice" (TIS) with SE "Liman". The share capital of this JV was only 31 million dollars, of which 16 (more than 50%) belonged to the Austrians as "investors". Thus, SE "Liman"’s share, represented by all its property, was valued at only 15.02 million, although the day before, it was appraised at 109.61 million! This blatant scam allowed immediate control of the "Liman" terminal. However, the leader of "Liman", Khomchenko, did not object, as he received the position of executive director and a significant share in TIS.

Oleksiy Stavnitser, 2000s

However, the Austrian company was in no rush to invest in the completion of the terminal, making it evident that it was simply a scam to seize state property. Another investor then appeared, the well-known Norwegian company "Norsk Hydro", which has been in operation since 1905. It not only invested 15.2 million dollars in TIS but also completed the terminal, which was fully operational by 1997. Here, a typical Ukrainian double-cross occurred: right after the construction was completed, the naive Norwegians, who intended to participate in the terminal’s management, were simply ousted from the business! Simultaneously, instead of the Austrians, a company "Fedcominvest", registered in Monaco and owned by Oleksiy Fedorychev, entered the business. The Monaco and French police accused Fedorychev of laundering money for Russian and international criminal groups (e.g., Lyubertsy organized crime group), arms and drug trafficking, so he entrusted dealing with the Norwegians to Oleksiy Stavnitser, who led TIS. Eventually, Fedorychev bought Norsk Hydro’s share, becoming the main owner of "Transivestservice", then, together with Stavnitser and Kutateladze, they divided the state’s stake in TIS (former SE "Liman") among themselves. That’s how this "most successful startup" was created!

Pier Scams

Currently, Oleksiy Fedorychev remains the main owner of "Transinvestservice". He directly owns 45.47% of the enterprise, with another 4% held through his company "Fedcominvest". A 35.3% share remains in question, recorded several years ago as belonging to the venture investment fund "Nobilis" (EDRPOU 38901630), with ownership data concealed. However, Yehor Hrebennikov, Andriy Stavnitser’s older brother, manages it. According to journalists, the fund is owned by the same Fedorychev, who keeps a low profile due to issues with the Antimonopoly Committee and law enforcement. On June 20, 2029, Agglomerated Olefin Company was even included in the NSDC’s sanctions list, but on May 14, 2020, Volodymyr Zelenskyy removed Fedorychev from this blacklist by decree №184/2020. In matters like this, one cannot impose sanctions on the boss of one’s "Odesa assistant" and the owner of an enterprise that allocated several million to the presidential fund!

As for Andriy Stavnitser, his brother Yehor Hrebennikov, and their partner Oleh Kutateladze, they directly control only 15% of TIS together. However, TIS is now a holding consisting of several enterprises: "TIS-ore", "TIS-coal", "TIS-container", and others, each with different ownership shares, and some involve firms from various countries. Nevertheless, most of these firms are also associated with Fedorychev or the Stavnitsers. However, they have an additional source of income: during the expansion of new TIS terminals, they privatized land plots underneath it (previously wasteland) and now lease them to their holding!

Things also turned out to be not in order regarding the 132-hectare land plot owned by TIS itself. In 2016, a Member of Parliament Vitaliy Kupriy handed over documents to law enforcement, indicating that TIS uses this land based on forged documents! The fact is that the ownership certificate for the land was issued on March 13, 2001, to the LLC with foreign investments TIS, while the company was still a JV then and only re-registered as an LLC in 2002.

Kupriy also talked about a 2007 corrupt agreement between the "Ukrzaliznytsia" officials and the company’s management regarding the arrangement of the station "Chornomorska-TIS", under which the railway stopped charging the appropriate fee for wagon servicing. As a result, the domestic budget lost nearly 60 million hryvnias a year and over half a billion over 10 years, which went into Fedorychev and the Stavnitsers’ pockets!

It’s worth mentioning another endeavor of TIS co-owners, reported by the media some time ago. It involved the same Kutateladze, who surprisingly managed to hold onto his share all these years. Of course, he is a key player in the world of Odesa corruption, but his role in TIS remains unclear: if the Stavnitsers are managers for Fedorychev, then who is Kutateladze? An answer to this question suggested that Kutateladze is TIS’s "overseer" on behalf of several influential people engaged in smuggling! Moreover, it involves not only Chinese consumer goods, where the issue is just unpaid customs duties but also cargo whose existence is carefully concealed: weapons and drugs. Journalists hinted that, in piles of scrap metal, ore, and coal, one could smuggle anything from a missile launcher to a ton of cocaine: only 1-2 border guards oversee loading and unloading, who are not hard to bribe.

Another scam turned out to be the widely publicized "arrival of a large international investor" by Andriy Stavnitser, referring to the "DP World" company from Dubai (where his son Davyd was then living and studying). In the fall of 2016, representatives of "P&O Maritime" (owned by "DP World" since 2006) approached the Minister of Infrastructure Volodymyr Omelyan and the director of the Odesa port Ihor Tkachuk with a business proposal to buy twelve tugs owned by the port. They proposed buying them for 50 million dollars, paying only half upfront and the rest in installments over 10 years. Along with these foreign representatives in the "P&O Maritime" delegation were Andriy Stavnitser and his TIS development director Filip Hrushko (see the list of individuals), lobbying the interests of the Arab firm. Moreover, it was later reported that Stavnitser himself initiated the entire scheme!

Even though Omelyan was not against the deal, it fell apart due to the Odesa port management’s stubbornness, followed by public involvement amid shock over financial calculations: according to them, the state could lose up to 4 billion hryvnias! For added impact, they even involved the port’s trade union, which went on a protest.

However, Andriy Stavnitser was not deterred, engineering another tugboat deal, this time in Pivdennyi port. His company "SD Capital" organized the purchase of the same "P&O Maritime" of the tug company "LB Shipping", which was renamed "P&O Maritime Ukraine". What’s in it for Stavnitser? The fact that he (along with Yehor Hrebennikov and Oleh Kutateladze) holds a stake in this company and effectively manages it, just as with TIS terminals. And now they solely control all the tugs in Pivdennyi  port, further opening the path to the entire port’s takeover (recall, TIS occupies only part of the port). They will shield themselves behind the involvement of the Dubai-based "DP World" company in TIS, offering robust political cover against Ukrainian authorities. So when NABU or the SSU next raid TIS offices, Stavnitser will loudly proclaim worldwide that obtuse Ukrainian investigators are scaring off international investors.

Serhiy Varis, for SKELET-info