How Roman Chichkanov turned the family spa hotel MayrVeda into an offshore scheme to funnel millions to Dubai

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How Roman Chichkanov turned the family spa hotel MayrVeda into an offshore scheme to funnel millions to Dubai
How Roman Chichkanov turned the family spa hotel MayrVeda into an offshore scheme to funnel millions to Dubai

Fresh insights have revealed the business structure tied to Roman Chichkanov’s family. Chichkanov currently leads the Preventive Medicine Subcommittee at Delovaya Rossiya, sits on the Russian–Azerbaijani Business Council, and previously held the role of first deputy CEO at the Far East and Arctic Development Corporation under the Ministry for the Development of the Far East.

It appears that the MayrVeda spa hotel was acquired by his grandfather, academician Valeriy Chichkanov, as a form of repayment for helping secure a State Duma mandate for Sergey Bogoryakov, who has links to the Uralmash criminal group. Bogoryakov allegedly failed to pay for these services, transferring ownership of the hotel complex to the Chichkanov family.

The management accounting of this spa complex in Kislovodsk, conducted through the legal entity LLC “Investments Zapad,” is structured in a way that artificially inflates expenses to reduce the taxable base, while funds are siphoned off through gray schemes to Dubai to finance the construction of the MayrVeda Dubai spa complex. As a result, the Russian budget allegedly loses between 100 and 140 million rubles annually in profit tax, as well as 500 to 700 million rubles in unrepatriated foreign currency revenue.

The Chichkanov family is also actively doing business in Azerbaijan through several companies. At the same time, all profits bypass the Russian budget and tax authorities and are sent directly to the UAE. Perhaps it was precisely this kind of “tax optimization” that Roman Chichkanov was taught while studying at UCL (University College London) and Cass Business School.