Ivanishvili Also Accuses Bachiashvili of Embezzling Millions Allocated for Mtkvari HPP

According to the lawyer, Giorgi Bachiashvili started working with Bidzina Ivanishvili at the request of his mother and for 13 years was employed in Ivanishvili's business structures, including holding the position of the executive director of the Georgian Co-Investment Fund until April 2019, and later becoming the chairman of the advisory board of the same fund. For many years, Bachiashvili was very close to Ivanishvili and enjoyed special trust.

Cryptocurrency business

According to the lawyer, while working as the executive director of the co-investment fund,

In the summer of 2015, Giorgi Bachiashvili approached Ivanishvili with a business proposal and offered to invest funds in Bitcoin, whose popularity and value was growing by the day.

Ivanishvili was interested in this proposal and decided to invest 5 million US dollars in Bitcoin mining.

According to the lawyer's statement, Ivanishvili wanted to give the investment money from his personal account, but Bachiashvili advised and convinced him to give the money to his company through Cartu Bank. In August 2015, Cartu Bank transferred 5 million US dollars to a foreign company controlled by Bachiashvili in the form of a loan. The loan issued by the bank was unsecured, and it was fully secured by Bidzina Ivanishvili’s personal funds.

After a certain period of time after investing the money, while communicating with Ivanishvili, Giorgi Bachiashvili expressed concern about the volatility of the cryptocurrency market. He was able to convince Bidzina Ivanishvili to recover the invested money by selling the earned bitcoins.

In August-September 2016, Giorgi Bachiashvili returned the 5 million dollars received from the bank in the form of a loan, and about a year later, he handed over 536,900 dollars to the director of Cartu Bank Nato Khaindrava, which, according to his own explanation, remained as profit after the return of the investment.

According to the statement released by the lawyer, at that time no one doubted Giorgi Bachiashvili's good faith, however, later, after there were serious grounds for assuming that the funds invested in one of the projects of the co-investment fund were being spent inappropriately, including by Giorgi Bachiashvili, Ivanishvili started looking into the bitcoin mining case and the correctness of the information provided by Bachiashvili.

According to the lawyer, it was found that Bachiashvili misled Ivanishvili and appropriated crypto-currency worth millions of dollars.

Question regarding Mtkvari Dam

In 2014, the co-investment fund bought the Mtkvari HPP project, the construction of which was stopped for years. According to the initial calculations, the total investment volume of the project was about 131 million dollars, and the HPP should have been put into operation as early as 2020. However, ultimately,

The construction cost of the project has increased by 100 million (which is a colossal difference compared to the original cost), to about 235 million dollars, and yet the project is still not finished.

According to the lawyer, this is probably due to the non-targeted spending, embezzlement, or misappropriation of funds intended for investment by the heads of the fund, which requires further/additional study by law enforcement agencies.

When the problems related to the HPP became obvious, Bidzina Ivanishvili became interested in the correctness of the information provided by Giorgi Bachiashvili regarding Bitcoin mining and made a late revision of the issue.

The existing doubts were deepened by the fact that after 2015 Giorgi Bachiashvili, and the enterprises founded by him and his family members, purchased dozens of immovable and movable assets (both in Georgia and abroad), which is in clear discrepancy with Giorgi Bachiashvili's actual income.

"Giorgi Bachiashvili has been employed in the structures belonging to Ivanishvili for many years, and his main income was generated here.

'It is logical for Ivanishvili to assume that Bachiashvili acquired the relevant property with the funds obtained from the sale of the appropriated bitcoins, as well as, possibly, with the large amount of funds illegally appropriated during the construction of the Mtkvari HPP,’’ – states the lawyer.

According to the statement, Giorgi Bachiashvili is currently the primary owner of one of the crypto platforms/crypto exchanges operating in Georgia, which he owns through various legal entities. There is an assumption that Bachiashvili was able to establish this business by investing in the appropriated cryptocurrency and using the appropriated cryptocurrency for the daily activities of the exchange.

The lawyer states that the allegation that the indictment against Bachiashvili is related to his political views is absurd.

‘’Mr. Ivanishvili only had business relations with Bachiashvili, neither the accused showed any interest in issues or processes with political content. Ivanishvili is not surprised by Bachiashvili's tactics,’’ says the lawyer, emphasizing that Bachiashvili was employed by Ivanishvili's companies back in Moscow, as well.

The prosecutor’s office accuses Giorgi Bachiashvili, the former head of the co-investment fund, of embezzling a large amount of money. The case concerns the illegal appropriation of 8,253.13 bitcoins and the legalization of illegal income. According to the prosecutor's office, the value of the said Bitcoin was 39,215,820 USD at the time of embezzlement. On July 6, the court granted Bachiashvili bail in the amount of 2.5 million GEL. He pleads not guilty. The crime is punishable by 9 to 12 years of imprisonment.