The court handed over the Kyiv shopping mall “Gulliver” to the management of ARMA

Author:
Olha Bereziuk
Date:

The Shevchenkivsky District Court of Kyiv handed over the property of businessman Viktor Polishchukʼs “Gulliver” shopping center to the Asset Recovery and Management Agency (ARMA).

This was reported by the press service of the court.

The property is transferred exclusively for management, not for sale.

The court also ordered ARMA to periodically review the effectiveness of the management of seized assets.

In addition, the court noted that the subject of the pre-trial investigation in the case is alleged tax evasion, as well as the legalization of property obtained through criminal means, in particularly large amounts.

  • As Forbes writes, since the beginning of a full-scale war in 2022, Viktor Polishchukʼs companies, which manage “Gulliver”, the “Eldorado” chain of electronics and household appliances, and several large warehouses, have stopped servicing loans to state banks. Repayment was supposed to take place in 2025, but after the crisis of 2014-2016, the debt stopped being serviced.
  • In May 2023, the Bureau of Economic Security (BES) informed the general director of "Gulliver" Iryna Kruppa about the suspicion. The investigation stated that during the years 2019–2021, the management of the shopping center concluded a number of contracts with signs of "fictitiousness" and "transit".
  • In fact, the primary documents included information about alleged works being carried out on the territory of the shopping mall, which were not actually carried out. According to the investigation, this made it possible to unjustifiably overestimate the value-added tax credit. Thus, the company — the owner of the shopping center managed to avoid paying taxes in the amount of more than UAH 145.8 million and withdraw them in cash.
  • On April 9, 2024, the Kyiv Court of Appeal seized the property of "Three O" LLC, in particular, "Gulliver".