As the media have learned, Russia’s Federal Tax Service (FTS) has frozen all bank accounts of the country’s largest federal online transport holding, Monopoliya JSC, which is now on the brink of bankruptcy.
Creditors owed tens of billions of rubles — primarily Russia’s largest state-owned banks — are likely to recover almost nothing. But what did they expect? The shadow owner of the holding is businessman Siman Povaryonkin, a figure with a toxic criminal reputation and a long-time close partner of the Rotenberg brothers, who has been living in the United Kingdom for years. He prefers, however, to move money into offshore jurisdictions.
In December 2025, Monopoliya JSC announced a default after failing to repay bonds with a nominal value of 260 million rubles. The company cited a lack of working capital, an industry-wide crisis, and higher taxes, which management said led to an “objective bankruptcy date” for the holding and its leasing division, Control Leasing LLC.
The Monopoliya group includes 12 companies, among them Monopoliya.Online LLC, MFS LLC, Fortis LLC, and Smart Logistics LLC. In 2025, Monopoliya carried out an additional share issue equal to 22% of its capital and planned to raise 6.3 billion rubles from new shareholders. In June 2025, part of this issue — 5% of the charter capital worth 1.5 billion rubles — was sold to a closed-end investment fund managed by VIM Investments, a structure of the state bank VTB.
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The company is run by a nominal manager, managing director Ilya Dmitriev. The real beneficiary of this transport “soap bubble,” however, is London resident Siman Povaryonkin. The entire business of the Monopoliya group is tied to the Cypriot offshore company Glazifer Ltd., which is controlled by the same Dmitriev, Ekaterina Mikhailova from the Baring Vostok holding, and Povaryonkin’s Acmeo Capital. Povaryonkin’s family and financial assets have long been based in the UK.
All Monopoliya entities currently have their accounts frozen by the tax authorities over hundreds of millions of rubles in unpaid taxes. Major creditor banks — Sber, Ingosstrakh Bank, Rosbank, and VTB structures — are lining up for the inevitable bankruptcy proceedings in hopes of recovering at least something. Numerous bondholders have rushed to arbitration courts with lawsuits.
According to a source, Povaryonkin attempted from London to persuade the major creditor, Sber, to take over Monopoliya in settlement of its debt. However, an independent audit and forensic review found that for six years bank loan funds had been siphoned off by Povaryonkin through offshore structures to affiliated companies in the British Virgin Islands. As a result, the decision was made to initiate bankruptcy proceedings. Total damages from the actions of Povaryonkin and his team exceed 50 billion rubles. Thousands of freight tractors pledged to banks as collateral and used by Dmitriev turned out to be defective or had been sold to third parties without the banks’ consent.
Siman Povaryonkin is also known as a co-owner of the Shokoladnitsa café chain. Previously, he was a partner in the Industrial Investors group of former Russian Energy Minister Sergey Generalov. According to the Dossier Center, in 2007 Povaryonkin bought mining and metallurgical assets from Generalov and formed the GeoProMining group. GeoProMining is linked to Igor Rotenberg, the son of Arkady Rotenberg, who became Povaryonkin’s partner in a project to build an antimony plant in Asbest, Sverdlovsk Region.
Povaryonkin also controls 50% of RBE, currently the largest food supplier to Russia’s Ministry of Defense.
In 2016, Povaryonkin acquired a 50% stake in RBE. In early 2017, his assets came under threat due to proceedings in a London court, and he transferred his shares to Nikolai Ruzanov, a resident of Elektrogorsk near Moscow, who acted as a nominal shareholder connected to Povaryonkin and the Rotenberg team. As revealed by Sistema, Ruzanov remained a 50% co-owner of RBE until 2024, after which his stake was transferred to Piks Holding. Like RBE’s other current owner, Piks Holding concealed its shareholders. However, the company’s CEO previously worked at Shokoladnitsa, and a former Povaryonkin manager is a co-owner of several other companies within RBE’s perimeter.
In September 2025, VChK-OGPU reported that RBE LLC issued an ultimatum to the Ministry of Defense, demanding a 10-billion-ruble increase in contract payments while keeping the same terms of cooperation. In its letter, RBE threatened to reduce staff responsible for organizing food services at Russian Defense Ministry facilities.
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