SUNDAY,
MARCH 20, 2022 - 13:00
€80 billion in Russian assets found in the
Netherlands: Report
At least 80
billion euros in assets linked to Russian companies can be found in the
Netherlands, according to a report by Het Financieele Dagblad in collaboration
with Company Info. Around 45 billion euros are connected to Russian oligarchs
and companies that have been sanctioned by the European Union following
Russia’s invasion of Ukraine.
The amount
of Russian assets left in the Netherlands is still unclear, but FD’s inventory
found 3,800 Dutch companies with a Russian connection. The companies include ones
owned by the Russian state, as well as natural gas group Gazprom, supermarket
company X5 Retail Group and telecom company Veon. Russian companies are often
connected with the Netherlands for favorable tax rates, according to FD.
“These are
of course not all bad companies,” sanctions lawyer Yvo Amar told FD. “And the
Ministry of Foreign Affairs has lured that money here itself with tax roadshows
and fierce lobbying at the embassy in Moscow.”
The
investigation found 18 parties that are on the European Union’s sanctions list:
14 oligarchs and the financial institutions Sogaz, VTB Bank, Bank Rossiya and
Gazprombank. The sanctioned individuals include CEOs of Russian media
companies. There are also oligarchs who have “strong interests in the
Netherlands” and have not yet been sanctioned by the European Union, including
the owner of Lukoil and Volga-Dnepr airlines, FD reports.
In
contrast, Dutch institutions have blocked 200 million euros in Russian assets
under the European Union sanctions. These assets were only in the form of bank
balances, however –– not companies that experts believe contain billions more
shares. Amar said one of the major challenges to getting at these assets is for
trust offices to find out “who actually runs the structure.”
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