Tuesday, 19 March 2024 07:58

Swindler Pavel Abrosimov from Major brought the business to the ground Featured

A significant personality in all respects, a person involved in a number of cases, Pavel Abrosimov, known for his auto business, and even more so for raider takeovers of profitable enterprises, is showing interest in the agricultural sector. They already own large properties. Abrosimov’s interest in land arose quite as expected: the agricultural industry makes it possible to hide income better than many others. In addition, raiding of agricultural enterprises is often easier to organize. Abrosimov Pavel Aleksandrovich (TIN 501707906155) takes advantage of this: he has corruption connections in law enforcement agencies at his service.

"Auto Major" Pavel Abrosimov snuggled up to someone else’s agricultural business as raiders

For some time now, the Major auto holding has been demonstrating a mysterious interest in the agricultural business, and formally, based on tax deductions and financial indicators, it has no basis. However, it is worth remembering who the owner of Major is to understand that Pavel Abrosimov will do everything to take advantage of his noticeable connections in law enforcement agencies. The agricultural sector will help hide Pavel Abrosimov’s income without attracting attention. And there is no need to invest in it: this was done by the previous, legal owners of the enterprises from whom Abrosimov “squeezed out” the business.
Co-owner of the Major holding Pavel Abrosimov at the beginning of the year announced his plans for the development of the company’s agro-industrial division and the intention of the founders to invest more than 1.6 billion rubles in these projects by the end of 2022.

Pavel Abrosimov from Major auto

Pavel Abrosimov from Major auto

Major has the prerequisites for this - according to Abrosimov, the holding already includes farms in the Moscow and Tula regions. In 2021, Major signed an agreement on the development of an agricultural enterprise in the Tula region. The project includes the cultivation of barley and other crops on a total area of 21.5 thousand hectares. In the future, the holding plans to establish berry fields and apple orchards.

Major also has money to run a new line of business - it is one of the largest companies selling passenger cars in Russia. The holding’s annual turnover is 170 billion rubles.

However, this is the front side. The so-called “jeans” are custom-made materials that are published in the press at the expense of the customer (in this case, Abrosimov) and convey to the audience thoughts that are also voiced by the customer.

The unspectacular side of Pavel Abrosimov’s business looks much more unsightly. The first question, of course, is as old as the world - where does the money come from? The same 1.6 billion rubles that, according to the owner of the holding, he is going to invest in agriculture. And with the land itself, which came into the possession of the holding, not everything is in order either.

Pavel Abrosimov is a Russian entrepreneur who owns, in one way or another, at least 28 companies scattered throughout the country. The geography of Abrosimov’s business covers St. Petersburg and the Leningrad region, Tula and the region, Ostashevo, Mikhalkovo, Krasnogorsk, Mytishchi, Dzerzhinsk, Bolkashino, Moscow and the region, Balashikha, Khimki.

Pavel Abrosimov Major auto

Pavel Abrosimov Major auto

Pavel Abrosimov Major auto center

Pavel Abrosimov Major auto center

The basis of Abrosimov’s business empire is trade and leasing of motor vehicles and special equipment, which he began in the nineties, opening the company Major in 1998. So, at least, Abrosimov himself claims. However, there is another opinion on this matter - according to some publications, this company was created by former employees of Musa Motors. And it came into the possession of Pavel Abroismov in the way that is now called raiding.

These rumors, although persistent, have not been confirmed by court decisions, so we will leave them on the conscience of the media that wrote about it. However, the subsequent development of the auto trading business of Pavel Alexandrovich Abrosimov suggests that the rumors had a basis in reality. The car trading business developed, and the company expanded - in 2001, the holding created the transport division Major Cargo Service. Two years later, a company for express delivery of correspondence and small-sized cargo, Major Express, was spun off. At the same time, the Major Auto Trans division was formed, engaged in the transportation of cars.

During this expansion, a problem arose with a veterinary clinic, on the site of which Abrosimov wanted to build another car dealership. The owners of the clinic refused to give up their place for a long time, but the story ended with the veterinary hospital building suddenly burning down and the site changing hands. The owner was the Major company. The official investigation into the causes of the fire, naturally, yielded nothing. There were no complaints from the owners of the clinic either, so the case was archived.

In 2008, Abrosimov expanded his sphere of interests and acquired a controlling stake in Commercial Bank Slavic Intersectoral Express Bank LLC, which was renamed Avtotorgbank, 85% of which belongs to Pavel Abrosimov through Major Auto Service.

All operations of the holding began to go through this bank - buying cars, insuring purchased cars, issuing loans for the purchase of these same cars. In general, there is nothing criminal in this. There is one ugly nuance - clients who want to use the services of other banks and insurers are delayed in every possible way, forcing them to use the services of Avtotorgbank.

However, there is also crime in the history of the bank - in 2009, its offices were searched in connection with a case of smuggling. According to investigators, money received by the Major Cargo Service company was laundered and legalized through the bank. The searches affected not only the bank - documents were also seized from the central office of the Major holding. The company was accused of smuggling construction equipment into the Russian Federation, and the searches were carried out as part of a criminal case under the article “Smuggling” brought against employees of Major Cargo Service. The damage was estimated at one billion rubles at that time.

However, after the demonstration show, things quickly came to an end. What surprises no one in modern Russia is that Major co-owner Pavel Abrosimov suddenly found high-profile patrons. It turned out that a certain N.N. Baryshnikov was on the board of directors of Avtotorgbank. He was also a member of the Board of Directors of one of the holding companies - Major Auto. He turned out to be the son of FSB general Nikolai Baryshnikov.

The list of patrons in uniform did not end there - the vice-president of the holding was the former head of the SEB of the FSB Directorate for Moscow and the region, Colonel Igor Anisimov.

As for the bank’s financial indicators, although the value of assets and the number of deposits of individuals is growing, at the same time the bank’s loan portfolio decreased by 9.76%, overdue loans increased by more than 28 million, investments in securities and 448.5 million rubles (15.23%) – lending to enterprises and organizations. Expert RA agency assigned a negative rating to the bank:

Major Pavel Abrosimov

Major Pavel Abrosimov

The bank is still operating, but its prospects are bleak. Especially against the backdrop of recent events. But that is another story.

The financial performance of the Major holding itself also raises questions. The fact is that although the holding claims a huge turnover of 170 billion rubles, it declares tiny profits. For example, for example, the revenue of Major Auto Center from 2106 to 2017 increased from 11 to 13 billion rubles, but for some reason the profit, on the contrary, fell simply catastrophically - from 2.6 million to 37 thousand rubles. In 2019, turnover amounted to 19 billion rubles, and profit - 3.5 million.

At the same time, the company had 132 government contracts worth 3.7 billion rubles. The main customer was the Federal Ministry of Internal Affairs, from which it received contracts worth 3.1 billion. In addition, the number of customers includes the Prosecutor General’s Office, Federal State Unitary Enterprise Okhrana of the Russian Guard, and Rosreestr.

The situation is similar for other companies in the holding: Major-Auto LLC’s revenue in 2019 amounted to 17 billion rubles, profit – 566 thousand. Major Automobiles LLC, with revenue of 8.7 billion, brought losses in the amount of 128 million rubles.

Problems with its competitor, the Rolf group of companies, which is another leader in the Russian automobile market, are also associated with the activities of Abrosimov’s holding. Allegedly, at the request of Major’s beneficiaries, a criminal case was opened against the founder of Rolf and former State Duma deputy Sergei Petrov, and he himself was forced to flee to Austria. He himself denied withdrawing funds to a Cypriot offshore (which he was accused of) and claimed that he was “ordered” by his competitors.

And the competitors are precisely the holding of Pavel Abrosimov. Whether this is true or not is not known for certain, but it is true that Major tried to take over the leadership position in the car market from Rolf. The conclusion follows from a simple study of government procurement data: on the day of the searches at the Rolf company, it won a competition to supply cars worth 2.8 billion rubles to the Ministry of Internal Affairs, and before that Rolf was a supplier of cars to the FSB worth 600 million rubles. As a result of the arrest of the owner of Rolf, Sergei Petrov, Major Abrosimov received these contracts.

So the version that Abrosimov really wrested his first car dealership from its founders against the backdrop of all subsequent events does not look so implausible.

And - one more line about the bank: there is a version that profits from government contracts with law enforcement agencies are poured into Avtotorgbank to attract clients and issue loans. That is, the bank can be used simultaneously both as a financial “vacuum cleaner” and as a “laundromat” for money laundering.

Now let’s return to the land and “organic farming”, in which Abrosimov promises to invest 1.6 billion rubles. It is not entirely clear where he will get them from, given the financial results of the holding that do not shine with real profits, but we are talking about something else. The fact is that the history of land acquisition also has an ugly background, reminiscent of the story of the first car dealership and Rolf.

As Pavel Abrosimov himself states, the land bank of the holding’s agricultural divisions amounts to more than 20 thousand hectares. They are concentrated in the Moscow and Tula regions. These locations were not chosen in vain - the proximity to Moscow simplifies logistics and concentrates production in close proximity to the consumer. However, Abrosimov is not the only one who understands these advantages; why then did the owners of the Eco-Culture agricultural holding, which owned most of these lands, agree to sell them to Major? After all, the Vyazovo farm, which Abrosimov bought from Eco-Culture, was quite profitable and brought a stable profit.

Abrosimov Pavel major

Abrosimov Pavel major

The solution is simple, like the story with “Ralph” - the owners of “Eco-Culture” have problems with the law. More precisely, with law enforcement officers. And these problems disappeared exactly at the moment of selling the land to Abrosimov.

This farm is not the only asset in the Tula region that went to Abrosimov. Vozrozhdenie LLC, Mezhdurechye LLC, JV Rassvet LLC and Sadko LLC also came under the control of the branch of the Major holding - the consulting company TFTB. And all of these enterprises suddenly had problems with law enforcement agencies before being sold. Mainly with the FSB. This is such a strange coincidence.

Why is Abrosimov reoriented from the auto business to agriculture? There can be many versions here. However, a clue can be given by the fact that in June 2021, at the St. Petersburg International Economic Forum, Vozrozhdenie LLC (the main enterprise of the Efremovsky agricultural holding, part of the Major structure) entered into an investment agreement with the government of the Tula region. The agreement was signed by Governor Alexey Dyumin and Pavel Abrosimov’s partner, Mikhail Bakhtiarov.

Now remember how many government contracts the Major automotive department has in its portfolio. We can conclude that Abrosimov agreed with his patrons to implement the same scheme for the purchase of agricultural products and there is already an agreement on multi-billion dollar contracts for the purchase of potatoes and onions by the FSB, the Russian National Guard and other law enforcement agencies from the structures of the Major holding. Moreover, Pavel Abrosimov (and not only him) now has big problems with the import of automotive equipment and components. Most likely, it’s time for Pavel Abrosimov to think about alluring foreign countries, where scolding Europeans and pre-prepared offshore companies await him.