High-profile case of Turboatom and Megabank closed after ten years of investigation
20 May 2024 12:14
EXCLUSIVE
The National Police has closed a criminal case against officials of Turboatom (now Ukrainian Energy Machines JSC), which had been pending for 10 years. This is stated in the response of the main department of the National Police in Kharkiv region to Kommersant Ukrainskyi 
“We sent a request to the Prosecutor General’s Office regarding the case that began in 2014, when the Office opened criminal proceedings on misappropriation and embezzlement of property on a particularly large scale by officials of Turboatom (now JSC Ukrainian Energy Machines).
The prosecutor’s office’s claims against the company, which is three-quarters owned by the state, were that Turboatom had not made deposits on market terms. Investigators found that under the terms of the 2012 agreement between Turboatom and Megabank, the deposit rate was set at 15%, while the NBU’s weighted average interest rate for the region at the date of the agreement was 22%.
At the same time, the main shareholder and owner of Megabank is Viktor Subbotin, the CEO of Turboatom and later Ukrainian Energy Machines. Thus, there is a clear conflict of interest in his actions.
At the same time, 10 years after the opening of the criminal proceedings, Subbotin’s activities, which cause a public outcry, continue. In particular, in April, the issue was raised by the Deposit Guarantee Fund. It stated that the major shareholder of Megabank, Viktor Subbotin, was not fulfilling his credit obligations to the bank on loans issued to his group of companies.
“…a number of loan agreements were executed and significant loans were issued to persons related to the Bank’s shareholder V. Subbotin, in particular, to a group of companies in which he or his family members are beneficiaries. As of today, the total debt under these loan agreements is over UAH 2.3 billion,”
– the Fund reported.
At the same time, these debtors do not fulfil their loan obligations, do not repay the loan or interest, and even try to withdraw liquid collateral through the court. All of this allegedly drove the bank to insolvency.
“Official requests of JSC MEGABANK to borrowers to pay money to repay the loan debt under the agreements concluded with the bank are ignored. All these actions indicate a deliberate evasion of fulfilment of monetary obligations to JSC “MEGABANK””
– said the Deposit Guarantee Fund.
Source
As it turned out, during the decade-long investigation, the case was transferred from the Prosecutor General’s Office to the Main Department of the National Police in Kharkiv Oblast, as the request was forwarded there
The response itself was concise and unexpected: the case was closed on 21 April 2024. At the same time, the National Police did not say why it was closed and did not publish any information about the ten-year investigation, as requested by
Viktor Subbotin has been in charge of Turboatom, or Ukrainian Energy Machines JSC, since 2007. The net profit of the state-owned enterprise in 2023 was UAH 203 thousand, and its debts exceeded UAH 2.5 billion. At the same time, Subbotin himself declares millions in assets, real estate and gold. Last August, he even personally confirmed that he had withdrawn Turboatom’s funds to Megabank. However, after this statement, none of the law enforcement agencies initiated an additional investigation of the banker.
