Who is Hennadii Balashov?
Balashov is 63 years old. His biography is known from the encyclopedia "Influential People of Ukraine", which was created by the "Ukrainian Peopleʼs Embassy" foundation, which was headed by the President of Ukraine Leonid Kravchuk.
In 1987, Balashov graduated from the Faculty of Economics of the Dnipropetrovsk State University. In 1994, he began to build a political career. Then he unsuccessfully ran for the post of chairman of the Dnipropetrovsk City Council. In 1998, he was elected to the Verkhovna Rada, where he was a member of the factions of the “Peopleʼs Democratic Party” and “Yabluko”. In parliament, he worked in the Committee on Finance and Banking.
Hennadii Balashov.
In the same year, together with businessman Leonid Chernovetsky, he founded the party "For a Beautiful Ukraine" and became its leader. A year later, he left it and created the party "Beautiful Ukraine", which he headed until 2003. Later, Balashov ran for the Verkhovna Rada of the IV, VII and VII convocations, for the Kyiv City Council (in 2014 and 2015), and for the post of President of Ukraine in 2019. He did not win any elections.
In 2012, Balashov called for the abolition of most taxes in Ukraine and launched the “5.10” movement. Two years later, he founded the party of the same name. He proposed leaving only two taxes — 5% on every purchase and 10% of the single social contribution from the salary. Balashov also said that business should develop without state regulation — this would help eliminate corruption and bureaucracy, because there would be fewer officials in the government.
Balashov speaks outside the office of his political party in Kyiv. This is also the office of his real estate agency "Lypky". Balashovʼs supporters near his office. The cow is the main symbol of "5.10".
What kind of business does Balashov own?
According to YouControl, Balashov is the founder of the private enterprise “Real Estate Agency “Lypky” and the service cooperative “Tsarskoye Selo”. According to the Unified State Register, from 2006 to 2018 he was also the beneficial owner of LLC “Credo Master”.
Since 2012, Balashov has been a host of radio and television programs about business, founded the School of Political Psychology center, where he worked as a business trainer, and wrote the books “How to Become an Adventurer? Reflections of a Millionaire” and “Monarchy of the Entrepreneur. How to Become a Tsar?” He taught his readers how to “make a fortune and create the image of a business person, taking into account the Ukrainian mentality and zero opportunities”.
In his books, Balashov writes that he became an entrepreneur after the start of "perestroika" in the USSR. In 1988, he founded the trade cooperative "Union", in 1990 — the private enterprise "Verolla" and opened the first commercial consignment store in Dnipropetrovsk.
In 1992, Balashov took the position of general director of the joint-stock company "Moscow", which was engaged in trade in the cityʼs underground passages. According to the encyclopedia "Influential People of Ukraine", Balashov was the owner of a chain of department stores, "Golden Bazaar", discos and roller rinks in Dnipropetrovsk.
Scandals and the Balashov criminal case
According to OCCRP investigative journalists, in 2015, Balashov transferred $100 000 to his account in the United States through an offshore company. When asked by journalists how he withdrew the funds, the businessman replied: “In a good way.” That same year, together with Oleh Prytula, a member of the 5.10 party, who withdrew $400 000 using the same scheme, he opened Oceanside Cottages LLC and became a co-owner of a hotel in a resort town in Florida.
In 2021, on the air of Yevhen Murayevʼs Nash TV channel, Balashov, commenting on the provisions of the Law on the State Language, advised Ukrainians to “run away from this territory, because there will be no good here”.
“Ukrainians will finally be able to get visas and start leaving this country. From language problems, the tax on fools, and 20% VAT,” he said.
That same year, the State Fiscal Service reported Balashov to the authorities on suspicion of evading 9.6 million hryvnias in taxes and seized his property. These were 18 real estate properties in Kyiv worth approximately 200 million hryvnias. According to the Kyiv City Prosecutorʼs Office, Balashov sold two premises and a land plot in Kyiv, deliberately understating the value of the property in order to pay less in taxes. Balashov denies all charges and believes that he was ordered to "rob, humiliate and punish".
In February 2022, Balashovʼs case was transferred to court. That same year, he moved to the United States, to the state of Florida. In an interview with Telegraf, he said that he had agreed with the judge to consider the case remotely. But when she retired, the new judge put Balashov on the wanted list.
The cover of Balashovʼs book from the time when he positioned himself as a business coach. A hotel in Florida co-owned by Balashov.
Balashovʼs YouTube channel
In the US, Balashov "tries to study people" and runs a YouTube channel. The money he earns from monetization, he says, is not enough to live on, so he has to save.
The YouTube channel "Hennadii Balashov" has 375 thousand subscribers. Together, all videos have collected over 77 million views. According to the analytical site Social Blade, on average, almost three thousand subscribers join the channel every week, and the videos collect over 1.2 million views over the same period. views. On the air, he talks about the "silent deal" to divide Ukraine, the clash on its territory between the "West and the East" and the dictator Volodymyr Zelensky.
We analyzed Balashovʼs extensive video "11 trillion in the ground. Ukraineʼs resource curse! In the heads of Trump, Putin and Zelensky. The deal." It was viewed 143 thousand times in two days. In it, Balashov comments on the proposals of Ukrainian officials and businessmen to transfer mineral reserves, estimated at $11.5 trillion, to the United States, and the desire of French President Emmanuel Macron to send 40 thousand troops to Ukraine.
Guessing what the US President-elect Donald Trump is thinking, Balashov says that he plans to exempt Russia from sanctions and give it the Donetsk and Luhansk regions. And foreign troops, dividing Ukraine into enclaves, will protect Vladimir Putin from Ukraine, because its government "constantly provokes Russia" and violates ceasefires, such as during the Minsk agreements.
Balashov says that on the eve of a full-scale invasion, President Volodymyr Zelensky wanted to "launch Nazis" on "the people of Donetsk and Luhansk”, while Putin, on the contrary, proposed resolving the conflict by electing a legitimate government and sitting down with it at the negotiating table.
Balashov also believes that the war is a continuation of Zelenskyʼs rule, so he will constantly "keep the country in a state of war”. And even during a truce, his propagandists, such as columnist Vitaliy Portnikov, will "stir up war hysteria" and "inspire the people with hatred for Russia". Because under such conditions, President Zelensky and the head of his Office Andriy Yermak will be able to usurp power and spend taxpayersʼ money on weapons.
In the same video, Balashov says that the Ukrainian and Russian peoples are “very close and have a common history” and that they have “knocked heads together”. He says that “there is nothing worse than brother hating brother,” but immediately corrects himself and says that he does not consider Russians to be brothers. According to Balashov, “we had a common family of the Soviet Union,” and the conflict between its members is “very well ignited”.
Balashov about Volodymyr Zelensky
Balashov believes that President Zelensky is trading in Ukraineʼs resources, which belong to the people under the Constitution, because he is "absolutely a hired man for the oligarchy" and for the sale of resources. He is also trying to embody the idea of the "Sun King”. That is, in the collocation "I am the state" — what exactly this means, Balashov does not explain.
One of Balashovʼs posts dedicated to Zelensky.
He also speculates on the topic of mobilization. He says that Zelensky wants to buy mercenaries, mobilize Ukrainian citizens over the age of 18, and have the US "flood him with weapons".
“I’m only afraid that Zelensky will go crazy so much that he will start biting the paw of the one who gives. He has already bitten almost all the leaders of Europe, [Joe] Biden and [Donald] Trump. We see a confused boy who does not know how to maintain his power… He will try to become a black colonel who will terrorize his citizens… And he will end up surrounded by enemies, and these enemies will not only be from outside. Russia, Belarus, part of Europe and half of America will huddle around him,” says Balashov.
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