Creditors "catch up" with the defendant Astion

Creditors "catch up" with the defendant Astion

The owner of Dnipro Agro Group holding, Vasyl Astion, is facing significant issues due to unpaid bank loans.

This refers to the litigation initiated by "Radabank," which might become the first among creditors aiming to recover debts from the notorious former deputy of the Dnipropetrovsk Regional Council and his assets. Details of the case are narrated by Nadiya Sklyarenko in the RBC-Ukraine article "Time to Pay the Bills. How the Hearings Will End on ’Radabank’s’ Lawsuit Against Astion."

The author reminds that "until recently, among the creditors of Dnipro Agro Group, according to the media, were ’TAScombank’ (credit line of 360 million UAH), ’Pivdennyi’ Bank (10 million USD), PUMB (1.65 million USD), ’Concord’ Bank (25 million UAH), and others."

Astion faced new problems because he couldn’t repay a relatively small debt (considering he owns gold watches worth 1.4 million UAH and has cash reserves of 33 million UAH and 690 thousand USD, based on his latest declaration for 2020) to Radabank amounting to 10.87 million UAH.

In May 2019, Radabank issued a loan of 16 million UAH for six months to LLC "Dniprovskyi pig complex", backed by several companies and Vasyl Astion, the owner of Dnipro Agro Group, which includes the debtor. However, the loan was not repaid, and in 2020 the bank filed a lawsuit seeking to recover 10.87 million UAH of the loan principal from the LLC. In April 2021, the commercial court of the Dnipropetrovsk region upheld the lawsuit and ordered the debt to be recovered jointly from LLC "Dniprovskyi pig complex’" and its guarantors LLC "FC ’Fingroup Factor’" and LLC "Peremoha".

Furthermore, Radabank decided to "chase" the main guarantor – Vasyl Astion – and filed two lawsuits against him and LLC "Dniprovskyi pig complex’" in the Novomoskovsk Interdistrict Court of the Dnipropetrovsk region, demanding the seizure of collateral items. The LLC might now lose so-called "biological assets" in the form of 2,823 pigs, buildings, and equipment, while Vasyl Astion might forfeit an entire list of movable and immovable properties, including his elite cars, apartment, house, and land plot, as per the report. According to the publication, the civil lawsuits are scheduled for hearings on October 28 and November 29.

"If these lawsuits are satisfied, the livestock business of Astion could be effectively ended. Other bankers might also list him as one of the most problematic debtors with a negative reputation," the journalist notes.

Incidentally, it raises genuine surprise that someone like Vasyl Astion and his structures even receive bank loans.

"A conviction for Astion, as well as for his father-in-law Mykhaylo Koshlyak, became a quite real perspective after the reopening of the trial of the indictment against them by the Zhovtnevyi Court of Dnipro in the summer of this year," the author of the material notes. Vasyl Astion is a defendant in a case related to raiding.