TWICE BANKRUPT. EX-HEAD OF VNESHPROMBANK WENT BANKRUPT IN ENGLAND

Georgy Bedzhamov, who escaped from Russian justice to England, was recently declared bankrupt by the High Court of London. The British Themis, which examined Bedzhamov's appeal on October 27, found no grounds for its satisfaction. Now the former owner of Vneshprombank (VPB) is waiting for the sale of assets.

According to the Deposit Insurance Agency (DIA), the decision of the British Themis will help to return funds to the victims of a bankrupt credit institution faster. However, no expert dares to say how long it will take, given the difficult geopolitical situation and the presence of economic sanctions. This is reported by Kommersant.

Vneshprombank went bankrupt in 2016, with debts to customers and partners amounting to about 233 billion rubles. It was possible to pay only 7.7% of the debt. The ex-president of the bank Larisa Markus (Bedzhamov's sister) was sentenced to 8.5 years in Russia.

Bedzhamov left the Russian Federation even before the bank lost its license and went bankrupt. In 2018, the businessman was declared insolvent. He received a similar status in the UK three years later. However, they filed a complaint against the manager. The case had to be reviewed anew.

By the autumn of 2022, the bankruptcy estate of the VPB was estimated at 24 billion rubles, which is about 10.3% of the organization's debt. The current decision of the London court opens up additional opportunities not only to search for the assets of a bankrupt in other countries, but also to recover funds from those assets that were discovered earlier.

One of these assets may be two London real estate objects worth £35 million, the reconstruction project of which has been approved by the local authorities. In 2019, the assets of the Bedzhamov family in the amount of £1.34 billion were already seized in England.

However, the execution of court decisions in Russia and the UK is not an easy matter. The implementation of the legal principles of reciprocity and politeness, experts believe, may be difficult due to the geopolitical situation. This is likely to happen if the recipient of Bedzhamov's debts turns out to be a person under international sanctions. At the moment, such sanctions do not apply to the DIA.