For this post we are doing something that we try to avoid, using a version of the article cached at the Internet Archive when it is available on the web. We do this not to deprive naked capitalism of the visits from those who click through but because it is a quick-n-dirty way to capture as many of the embedded hyperlinks as possible before they rot away. The original naked cap link will be prominent after the jump.
Yves here. This 2014 post by our house
Sherlock Holmes of international scammers, Richard Smith, is a classic
example of Naked Capitalism not simply being onto a story early, but
even more than five years later, demonstrably providing depth and detail
you won’t find anywhere else.
Richard did a deep dive into the dodgy appointment of Hunter Biden
and then Secretary of State John Kerry’s long-standing bundler, Devon
Archer, to the board of Burisma Holdings. Richard quickly got past the
noteworthy fact that Biden Jr. was being paid quite a lot for no
relevant expertise and no investment in the company…so what was he being
paid for, exactly? Oh, and Richard also describes how Hunter’s and his
uncle James Biden’s past financial rides were with con artists.
But the real puzzlement is that from everything that can be inferred,
Burisma is either tiny or just a shell company. So who is behind these
big director payoffs payouts? Richard found some bread
crumbs that pointed to Burisma being owned by Privat Group, a
conglomerate controlled by the Ukrainian oligarch Ihor Kolomoisky. We’ll
turn the mike over to Mark Ames:
Kolomoyskiy is the Berezovsky of current Ukrainian
oligarchs. The dirtiest of the bunch, absolutely loathed by the
IMF/creditor crowd especially for his theft of billions through the
collapse of Privat Bank a few years ago.
Yet Kolomoyskiy also was one of the main funders of the Maidan
revolution and of many of the neo-Nazi paramilitary death squads (and
yes, he’s Jewish and Israeli–just business, Fredo). Kolomoyskiy had to
flee Ukraine to Switzerland for a couple of years in a classic
intra-oligarch war with Poroshenko, IMF and others. He backed [recently
elected Ukrainian president Volodymyr] Zelensky’s rise to power, and
returned to Ukraine soon as Zelensky won. None of this will make for an
easy narrative about Biden Jr. except to show what a dirty cesspool he’s
profiting off amid all that mass poverty in Ukraine, of and what a
shitshow his dad helped make of that cursed country.
Before you wonder if Trump was also trying to get to Kolomoyskiy, say
that he had delusions of making a deal between Russia and Ukraine via
the power behind the throne, Kolomoyskiy, Ames cautions:
I don’t think anyone knows what the fuck they’re doing or
what’s going on. Even Russians never figured out Ukraine politics.
Hunter got to wet his beak for reasons he never quite grasped, used by
forces he never understood, just like our whole Maidan project.
And Lambert noted:
Chaos, ideal to project onto.
And both sides have had since August 12 to buy whatever evidence and
witnesses they want, in a country that will sell whatever they want.
Pass the popcorn.
This post first ran on May 21, 2014
Here’s last week’s big announcement, adorned by a photograph of an
American with a faintly alarming rictus; oh yes, oh dear me, yes: Hunter Biden joins the team of Burisma Holdings:
Burisma Holdings, Ukraine’s largest private gas producer,
has expanded its Board of Directors by bringing on Mr. R Hunter Biden
as a new director.
R. Hunter Biden will be in charge of the Holdings’ legal unit and
will provide support for the Company among international organizations.
On his new appointment, he commented: “Burisma’s track record of
innovations and industry leadership in the field of natural gas means
that it can be a strong driver of a strong economy in Ukraine. As a new
member of the Board, I believe that my assistance in consulting the
Company on matters of transparency, corporate governance and
responsibility, international expansion and other priorities will
contribute to the economy and benefit the people of Ukraine.”
Wholehearted approval was not universally forthcoming:
Isn’t that a bit fishy? Why do you say that?
Because he’s the vice-president’s son! That’s a coincidence. “This is totally based on merit,” said Burisma’s chairman, Alan Apter.
He doesn’t sound very Ukrainian. He’s American, as is the other new board member, Devon Archer.
Who? Devon Archer, who works with Hunter Biden at
Rosemont Seneca partners, which is half owned by Rosemont Capital, a
private equity firm founded by Archer and Christopher Heinz.
Who? Christopher Heinz … John Kerry’s stepson.
I think Putin’s propaganda people can take a long weekend; their work is being done for them. What do you mean?
Hasn’t Joe Biden pledged to help Ukraine become more energy independent in the wake of its troubles with Russia? Well, yes.
And isn’t Burisma, as a domestic producer, well positioned to profit from rising gas prices caused by the conflict?
Possibly, but Hunter Biden is a salaried board member, not an investor.
According to anonymous sources in the Wall Street Journal, neither
Rosemont Seneca nor Rosemont Capital has made any financial investment
in Burisma.
So it’s not fishy at all? No one’s saying that.
Do say: “Somebody needs to get involved in Ukraine’s
corporate governance, and it might as well be a clutch of rich,
well-connected American dudes with weird first names.”
Don’t say: “Thanks, Dad.”
The White House did the best they could with the optics…
The White House shot down any notion of a conflict of
interest with Hunter Biden’s appointment. In a statement provided to
Business Insider, Joe Biden spokesperson Kendra Barkoff said Hunter’s
appointment did not constitute an endorsement by the vice president.
“Hunter Biden is a private citizen and a lawyer. The Vice President
does not endorse any particular company and has no involvement with this
company,” Barkoff said. “For any additional questions, I refer you to
Hunter’s office.”
Commenters at Daily Kos affirm pugnaciously that there’s nothing to see here:
So the Vice President’s son who has been a high powered
lawyer for years who has passed the Bar in DC, CT and the Supreme Court
with a speciality in international law and relations shouldn’t sit on
company boards? Is this what you are trying to say?
For me, that’s final confirmation that there’s something to see here. But what?
Mollie Hemingway at The Federalist nails it. From her list of nine questions, numbers 7 and 9 are worth particular emphasis:
7. Why would a Ukrainian energy company want Devon Archer or Hunter Biden to serve on its board?
Assuming that they have been appointed to the board, the most
innocent explanation is that the company wants to increase foreign
direct investment and views Archer and Biden as having the experience to
make that happen. Archer, for example, is a long-time investor and
financier.
The most disturbing explanation is that the company is attempting to
curry favor with the U.S. government by enlisting the services of the
close family friend and campaign bundler of the Secretary of the State
and the son of the vice president.
…
9. This has to be a hoax, right?
It’s so bizarre that you almost have to assume it’s a hoax. It sounds
more like a cliched movie plot — a shady foreign oil company co-opts
the vice president’s son in order to capture lucrative foreign
investment contracts — than something that would actually happen in real
life. But the indications as of this afternoon are that the board
appointments actually happened, and that a Ukrainian energy company has
retained the counsel of the vice president’s son and the Secretary of
State’s close family friend and top campaign bundler.
Take question 9 first. The answer could indeed be “yes”.
However, it is not R. Hunter Biden’s appointment that is a hoax, nor
Devon Archer’s; nor is it, for that matter, the appointment of the
ex-President of Poland, Aleksander Kwasniewski, who is also on Burisma’s board, as of January. No, it’s Burisma itself that looks flaky, even on a casual inspection.
But surely, that would be a failure of due diligence on the part of
messrs Biden, Archer and Kwasniewski? Indeed it would, but there is a
most unfortunate precedent for such a failure, which you can read about here,
at some length. To sum it up: in 2006 or so, two Bidens, James Biden
(future VP’s brother) and our R. Hunter Biden (future VP’s son), wildly
overpaid a drug-addicted very senior Moonie
for a hedge fund marketing operation that was hugely exaggerating its
size and success, and turned out to be distributing ponzis, including
the giant Allen Stanford ponzi, second only to Madoff, and other eyecatching frauds, such as Ponta Negra, via a sales network that included brokers with visibly very terrible FINRA records.
None of this makes the Bidens look particularly astute. Much of it
would have been very easy to pick up with proper due diligence.
By 2009, Hempton, FT Alphaville and Felix Salmon (linkfest) were all over the story. Bits of it even crept out into the print media.
Final point from Hempton:
Paradigm rejects that the notion that they actively
participated in the alleged Ponta Negra scam. That is an accusation I
do not make. I only make the suggestion that – through clumsiness and
the failure to perform even the simplest due diligence – they lend their
name to alleged scammers.
Which brings us, five years after the Paradigm scandal blew up, to R.
Hunter Biden’s new job at Burisma Holdings, a company that has a
mysterious past.
By way of due diligence, we need to make a little dive into some old
SEC filings of a US OTC Stock, Sunrise Energy Resources (now called
Green Technology Solutions). In their filing for the fiscal year ended
December 31, 2003, filed 3 Dec 2004, we find the following in the notes to the financial statements:
Effective October 4, 2004, the Company and certain
stockholders entered into a Stock Purchase Agreement and Plan of
Reorganization (the “Agreement”) with the stockholders of Esko Pivnich
(“EP”), an oil and gas production and development company incorporated
and operating in the Republic of Ukraine, to acquire all of the
outstanding shares of EP. The Company is to issue that number of shares
which, when added to the 5 million shares sold to the EP stockholders in
connection with this transaction by five of the Company’s foreign
institutional stockholders, will result in the Company’s current
stockholders retaining, in the aggregate, 9% of the enlarged company,
which will then have 17 million shares issued and outstanding. There are
a series of conditions precedent to closing of the transaction,
including listing of the Company’s shares for trading on OTC “Pink
Sheets”.
There is also a handy list of directors and executive officers of the company, including a youngster called Taras Burdeniy who, ten years later, is part of the team at Burisma.
In the filings for year end 2006, section “description of business” we find another deal:
On January 20, 2006, Sunrise Energy Resources, Inc.
executed a share purchase agreement with the shareholders of Pari, Ltd.
The board of directors of Sunrise Energy Resources, Inc. approved the
transaction on February 9, 2006.
…and an address I’d like you to remember, EP’s offices in Ukraine, at 10a Ryleeva St., Kiev, Ukraine.
Sunrise chugs along producing a bit of oil and gas for a few years.
But we are talking thousands of barrels, not millions: it is not some
hydrocarbon Eldorado. At its peak, the operation is capitalized at about
$20Mn.
But alas, a series of catastrophes is related in the 10-K filed on 31st March 2009:
according to the geologist, Sunrise has zero proven reserves, which
finishes them as an investment proposition. One of their funders,
Millington Solutions, has called in its debt. Oh, and Sunrise has
changed accountants.
In the same 10-K Burisma Holdings Limited, of 17 Gr Xenopolou Street,
3106, Limassol, Cyprus, puts in an appearance as the holder of just shy
of 70% of Sunrise’s common stock.
It’s all recapped again in a preliminary info filing, Sept 4 2009. Upshot:
- Sunrise’s equity holders are wiped out. Since Burisma paid only a
nominal fee for the privilege of holding 70% of the Sunrise equity, they
probably don’t mind too much. As for the other 30%, who knows what they
think; they have put no comments on the record.
- Millington Solutions waltz off with Sunrise’s wholly owned
subsidiaries Esko Pivnich and Pari, both with the address 10a Ryleeva
St., Kiev, Ukraine. Now debt-free, EP and Pari might at best have some
underdeveloped mining assets to pick over.
Millington Solutions LLC (properly Millington Solutions Limited),
formerly of Suite 401, 302 Regent Street, London, was deregistered in
August 2009, mere months after the above shenanigans. Millington was
rather an opaque entity, of a particularly English style. English
company law allows companies to be directors of companies, which, while
pleasingly recursive, doesn’t do much for transparency. Thus we find
that the directors of Millington Solutions are:
Terthur Trading Limited, a BVI company which Opencorporates can’t tell me anything about, except that it directs or acts as secretary for another 1,065 companies just as opaque as Millington Solutions…
and
Lambert Investments Limited, which says it’s British,
(although I couldn’t actually find a live British company called Lambert
Investments Limited), directs 384
companies just as opaque as Millington Solutions, many still
registered, and sometimes has a Cypriot co-director, Georgios
Amerikanos, a director of 122 UK companies.
In other words, it’s a big shell company network of a classic British
kind, with ownership and control completely obfuscated. The Companies
Act 2006 introduced a requirement that at least one company director
should be a flesh-and-blood human being (“natural person“), but as we can see, Millington Solutions got its work done just before that loophole was closed.
There’s another question. How is it that, 5 years after the utterly
opaque Millington rode off into the sunset with Esko Pivnich and Pari,
and Burisma Holdings was left empty-handed, it’s now Burisma Holdings
who say they own Esko Pivnich and Pari?
It’s all as murky as hell. If I were R. Hunter Biden, I wouldn’t touch
it; but as we saw from the Paradigm saga, R. Hunter doesn’t look before
he leaps.
Another thought: could it be that Millington, Burisma, Esko Pivnich
and Pari were owned by the same one person all along? All this calling
in of loans would then just be corporate kabuki: a tax dodge, say, or
some sort of favour to an oligarch or politician…or just the final
public move of a good old-fashioned penny stock scam.
This is what one careful Ukrainian journalist dug up in 2012:
…Burisma changed owners last year: instead of Zlochevsky
and Lisin, the company was taken over by a Cypriot off-shore enterprise
called Brociti Investments Ltd. Pari and Esko-Pivnich also changed their
address: they moved from Kateryny Bilokur Street to 10a Rylyeyeva
Street in Kyiv. A third company was already waiting for them in the same
building – the above-mentioned Ukrnaftoburinnya.
…
The owners of Ukrnaftoburinnya, Pari, and Esko-Pivnich were finally
confirmed through first-hand sources. Oleh Kanivets worked as CEO of
Ukrnaftoburinnya for two years. He confirmed who actually controlled the
above-mentioned companies to “Slidstvo.Info”.
”The Privat Group is the immediate owner. This company was founded by
Mykola Zlochevsky some time ago, but he later sold his shares to the
Privat Group”.
There’s that address again: 10a Ryleeva St., Kiev, Ukraine.
The identification of Privat Group as the owner of Burisma, though
unconfirmed, is logical enough. Privat Group is a conglomerate
controlled by the ferocious Ukrainian oligarch Ihor Kolomoisky.
Kolomoisky is one of the oligarchs charged with holding down the Eastern provinces of Ukraine,
and recently mocked Putin, reputedly sensitive about his height, as a
“schizophrenic shortarse” (apologies for the English intonation:
American alternatives are invited); definitely a bridge-burning moment.
Putin, meanwhile, shut down as much of Kolomoisky’s bank as he could, in
Crimea and Moscow. I’m not sure who started it, but we can certainly mark it down as a first-rate spat....
