Editor’s Note: The following investigation was conducted by the Washington, D.C.-based Organized Crime and Corruption Reporting Project, a Kyiv Post partner.
Between mid-2015 and mid-2016, Privatbank, the largest bank in Ukraine, handed out over $1 billion in loans to firms owned by seven top managers and two subordinates of its owner at the time, Ihor Kolomoisky, according to a copy of its 2016 loan book reviewed by a reporter for OCCRP. Subsequently, in December, the bank was nationalized after the government found that it was severely undercapitalized, threatening the country’s financial system.
