Three Dutch commissioners of Amsterdam Trade Bank (ATB), owned by Russian oligarchs, see no reason to resign in the attack on Ukraine. The bank confirms this after questions from NRC† Two of the four Russian owners have been on the European sanctions list since the invasion for ties to the Kremlin.
Lex Hoogduin, former director of De Nederlandsche Bank (DNB) and a supervisory director at ATB since February 2021, states by telephone that the bank’s top is “obviously busy” with the situation in Ukraine. He will not answer any further questions. Chairman of the Supervisory Board Ruut Meijer, former head of corporate clients at ABN Amro, says that ATB “neatly adheres to all the rules”. Commissioner Hans van Damme (ex-partner KPMG) also says he sees “no reason to resign”.
The trio “continues to act in the interest of the bank and all stakeholders”, a spokesperson for the bank reported to the Amsterdam Zuidas when asked. The same goes for two other commissioners, the Danish former IMF director Poul Thomsen and the South African Andrew Baxter. Two Russian commissioners, Andrei Sokolov and Oleg Vaksman, have resigned, according to the bank.
In Russian hands
Amsterdam Trade Bank is 77 percent owned by four Russian oligarchs, according to a statement issued by the bank’s summit in May 2021. signed† Two of them, Ukrainian-born Mikhail Fridman and Russian Petr Aven, are on the European Union’s sanctions list because of the Ukraine war. By freezing their assets, they can no longer do business in the West. Together they own 42 percent of the bank as “ultimate beneficial owner”, the document shows. The other two Russian owners, Alexei Kuzmichov and German Khan, are not on international sanctions lists.
According to the European Commission, Fridman and Aven are among President Vladimir Putin’s close friends. Aven, whose fortune by business magazine Forbes is going to be estimated at $4.6 billion, is said to have been friends with the Russian president since the early 1990s. Fridman is said to be a “facilitator of Putin’s immediate environment.” His net worth is estimated at $12.1 billion.
Our activities will continue as usual
spokesman ATB
The business empire of Mikhail Fridman and his partners has been under pressure since the Ukraine war. In early March, he and Aven left the board of their Luxembourg investment firm LetterOne, earlier this week laid Kuzmichev and Khan also resigned their directorships. In Amsterdam, where part of their business interests are housed, Fridman and Aven stepped down as directors of telecom company VEON (formerly Vimpelcom) and retail group X5. Both concerns are located in the Netherlands, on the Zuidas, for tax reasons.
Law firm Houthoff recently broke off its long-standing relationship with VEON and LetterOne, because it no longer wants to assist clients affiliated with the Russian state. And on Tuesday, former Randstad director Robert-Jan van der Kraats reported in The Financial Times to resign as a director of VEON “for personal reasons”.
Alfa Bank
Amsterdam Trade Bank is a subsidiary of Alfa Bank, Russia’s largest private bank. Fridman and his three business partners are founders of Alfa Bank, in which they still have a joint interest of 82 percent to own† The international sanctions due to the Ukraine war partly apply to Alfa Bank. For example, the bank is not allowed to issue new bonds. However, the bank balances are not frozen.
The spokesman for ATB emphasizes that his bank is not affected by the EU sanctions: “Our activities continue as usual.” The sanctioned owners Fridman and Aven are said to have “no involvement at all” in the day-to-day operations of ATB. “The bank is managed by an independent management.” Moreover, according to ATB, the duo is only an indirect shareholder as owners of Alfa Bank.
ATB has condemned the invasion of Ukraine. In a statement On its website, the bank calls it “a war that Russia must stop.”
With assets under management of 1.2 billion euros, ATB is a small party in the Netherlands. Until 2021, the bank was mainly active as a provider of loans to shipping companies and commodity traders.
Particularly striking is the origin of the customers. From documents that NRC found that one-fifth of borrowers are located in the Marshall Islands. For example, ATB provided oil transporter Top Ships with credit for the purchase of an oil tanker. The Pacific island group was on the EU’s list of tax havens until 2019.
FIOD raid
In 2017, the tax investigation service FIOD raided ATB on suspicion of violation of the Money Laundering and Terrorist Financing Prevention Act. This resulted in a criminal investigation that according to research platform Follow the Money related to the so-called Vimpelcom case. According to the Public Prosecution Service, this telecom company has been guilty of bribery and forgery for years. ATB accounts were used for this. Vimpelcom bought criminal proceedings for 700 million euros from the Dutch and American authorities.
Also read: There’s another money laundering carousel
Later, ATB again came under the attention of the judiciary in connection with a large money laundering scandal, also known as the Russian Laundromat mentioned† Various banks in Europe are said to have laundered billions of Russian money, including through ATB accounts. The investigation into this is still ongoing, ATB confirms.
In any event, until recently, the bank was subject to increased supervision by De Nederlandsche Bank. An inspection “into the management of integrity risks in July 2019 has shown that there are a number of points where ATB can further improve its supervision”, the company itself reports in its annual report for 2020.
After the scandals, ATB announced a strategic turn. Ship loans are being phased out, in favor of loans to European small and medium-sized enterprises. In the annual report, ATB states that the central bank gave “permission” for the change of course to an online bank – under the new name FIBR. When asked whether the bank will drop the ship loans at the insistence of the regulator, DNB says it cannot answer.
In recent years, ATB has attracted prominent figures from the financial world with Lex Hoogduin, Ruut Meijer and Hans van Damme. Fridman previously managed to recruit former Swedish Prime Minister Carl Bildt and former British Employment Minister Mervyn Davies at his investment vehicle LetterOne. The latter is now CEO of Letter-One. He is now in England under great pressure to resign due to his work for Fridman’s company.
A version of this article also appeared in NRC on the morning of March 10, 2022