Three Russia-based companies and an individual were designated by the U.S. Treasury Department for trying to recapture more than $1.5 billion in frozen shares owned by a previously sanctioned Russian oligarch using a complex evasion scheme.
The Treasury’s Office of Foreign Assets Control (OFAC) designated Oleg Vladimirovich Deripaska in 2018 for his association with the Russian government. The Department of Justice charged Deripaska in 2022 with conspiring to violate and evade U.S. sanctions in violation of the International Emergency Economic Powers Act.
In June 2023, Deripaska planned with Russian citizen Dmitrii Aleksandrovich Beloglazov, the owner of Russia-based financial services firm Titul, to sell Deripaska’s frozen shares in a European company, the Treasury detailed in a press release Tuesday. Soon after, Beloglazov created a subsidiary of Titul, Iliadis, which acquired investment holding company Rasperia in early 2024. Rasperia held Deripaska’s frozen shares.
Beloglazov, Titul, and Iliadis were designated for operating in the financial services sector of the Russian Federation economy. Rasperia was sanctioned for its relationship with Iliadis.
“Anyone still doing business in or with Russia should be skeptical of supposed divestment schemes that involve shell companies or proxies linked to sanctioned oligarchs,” said Under Secretary of the Treasury for Terrorism and Financial Intelligence Brian Nelson in the release. “Corporate sales and acquisitions can be abused for money laundering and sanctions evasion.”
All property and interests in property of sanctioned individuals that’s in the United States or held by or controlled by U.S. persons are blocked and must be reported to OFAC.
Any entities that have 50 percent or more ownership, directly or indirectly, by sanctioned people are blocked. Any transactions by U.S. persons or within the United States involving sanctioned persons or entities are also blocked.
In an unrelated action Wednesday, OFAC designated two Nicaraguan gold-mining companies and a Russian training entity for aiding a repressive regime in Nicaragua.
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