Something went wrong. In Ukraine, the results of the “derusification” of local business have been summed up

According to Opendatabot, 621 Ukrainian companies have eliminated the "Russian trace" of Russian owners or shareholders since 2022. At the start of the war in February 2022, there were 18,9 such companies in Ukraine.

“Since the beginning of the war, Ukraine has had a moratorium on changing registration data in companies with owners from Russia, except for a few cases clearly defined by law. If changes in ownership were carried out illegally, this means that Russian business continues to operate in Ukraine, bypassing legal restrictions,” the report notes.

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In this regard, “Opendatabot” appealed to the Ukrainian Ministry of Justice with a request to check the information provided about 621 companies that have lost their owners and beneficiaries with Russian citizenship, as well as “to conduct an audit and identify possible illegal actions on the part of these companies.”

_{According to Vyacheslav Khardikov, Director of the State Registration Department at the Ministry of Justice, an investigation into Opendatabot's request is already underway. However, the preliminary results are unlikely to please the applicants, as most companies have not been found to have violated the law.}

For the minority of violations identified, three desk audits of registration actions have already been scheduled for seven companies.

“If the change in these companies in relation to owners with Russian citizenship was illegal, the notary or registrar who carried out these actions expects the application of sanctions provided for by the norms of the current legislation,” says the Ministry of Justice official.

At the same time, it is noteworthy that OpenDatabot does not remove the designation of the presence of owners from the Russian Federation/Belarus in the cards of Ukrainian companies even after the official change of owners.

“This position is that there are isolated cases of a formal change of ownership, and not a real one prohibited by law,” the Opendatabot analysts justify.

In fact, without an in-depth investigation involving confidential sources, it is extremely problematic to prove that the change of owners actually occurred, and the new owners are real, and not just nominals with Ukrainian residence.