Finiko pyramid suspends payouts and demands users’ personal data

On July 13, the Finiko financial pyramid announced a suspension of payments and requested customers to provide documents confirming the provenance of their funds. This information подтвердил the founder of the company, Kirill Doronin.

In users’ personal dashboards, when attempting to withdraw funds, a list of documents the company requests is displayed. These include:

• a proof of income in the form used in your country;
• loan agreements;
• a bank statement for the last 12 months;
• purchase agreements;
• proof of taxes paid for the previous year;
• a letter of recommendation from a bank.

The submitted documents, Doronin said, will allegedly undergo verification, the duration of which will be determined on a case-by-case basis.

Data: Telegram chat of Finiko users.

According to information in one of Finiko’s Telegram chats, users were asked, from July 13 to July 16, not to take any action in their personal dashboards, not to withdraw funds or cashback, and not to register new partners.

Finiko explained that such a measure was due to ongoing “compliance for entering international markets” and a “transition to the legal plane”.

“Trading accounts are moved to other brokers with a new package of documents and under new legal entities”, they added.

The company, however, cited Clause 3 of the Offer Agreement, which in fact does not contain such information, as it concerns “payment under the contract”. It only stipulates the customer’s responsibility “for the fulfillment of all obligations to pay taxes and fees in accordance with the laws of the state of which he is a resident”.

Data: thefiniko.com.

Earlier, the company did not warn about the need to report income provenance.

For document forgery, users were threatened with account blocks.

One Finiko investor, speaking anonymously, said he intends to file a lawsuit with the authorities against the top leaders who recruited new users in his city.

“Plans are to find other like-minded victims and attempt to file collective statements with the police and the prosecutor’s office specifically against those who recruited in the city where I live. They said completely different things and must answer for their words,” he told ForkLog.

The personal loss from the pyramid’s activities was estimated by our interviewee at $27,000.

“I will file complaints against local top managers. I think that’s the only way I can get my money back,” he added.

Author of the Telegram channel “Sighs of Satoshi” Rafael Manvelyan told ForkLog, citing the owner of a car showroom in Naberezhnye Chelny, that Finiko depositors surrender cars obtained under the program “car for 35% of the cost”. They allegedly do not haggle and agree to the price the showroom offers.

Data: Telegram channel “Sighs of Satoshi”.

According to one Finiko adherent, people fear that in the event of criminal proceedings and prosecutions their property obtained from this pyramid’s activities could be seized, and the deal could be deemed void. Perhaps this is how the most savvy individuals who have obtained some insider information from the top act,

Under Russian law, the liability for Finiko organizers is criminal:

“In Russia, the organization of financial pyramids carries various fines and penalties. The main article is Article 159 of the Criminal Code ‘Fraud’, which provides for a fine of up to 1.5 million rubles and imprisonment up to 10 years.”

The lawyer added that a company deemed a financial pyramid by the Central Bank cannot, by default, have legitimate claims, especially those involving requests for financial documents from users.

“The provenance of funds verification is a legitimate procedure if conducted by companies that comply with financial regulation, have licenses and all necessary permissions. But this procedure should be carried out before a user invests money, not when requesting its return with promised interest,” said Andrey Tugarin.

According to him, this maneuver by Finiko was designed to “buy time” on payouts.

Criminal cases against the pyramid have been opened by prosecutors in Tatarstan and in the Kazakh city of Almaty. According to independent experts, the number of victims is no less than 850,000, and the losses from the pyramid’s activities reach $4 billion.

Earlier, ForkLog reported that the founders of Finiko were suspected of an exit scam.

The founders of the Finiko pyramid were suspected of an exit scam

According to media reports, Kirill Doronin acquired Turkish citizenship and bought property in Thailand. His current whereabouts are unknown.

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