Roman Abramovich had options. In 2005, the Russian government paid him $13bn for Sibneft, to buy back, at huge profit to him, the oil company he’d paid them just $250m for 10 years earlier. He used that windfall to expand his luxury property portfolio and art collection and poured money into Chelsea FC. But it was the less high-profile investments that absorbed the majority of the cash, including about 200 hedge funds with complex corporate structures almost always involving the British Virgin Islands (BVI).
An investigation by the Guardian, the Bureau of Investigative Journalism and the BBC, published last week, revealed how Abramovich may have exploited Britain’s offshore havens to funnel wealth through Cyprus to the BVI and dodge up to £1bn in UK tax. That sum exceeds even Bernie Ecclestone’s historic tax settlement.
