The Technica case: Large carriers evade taxes by splitting up their businesses
Large trucking companies are massively avoiding taxes by splitting up their businesses, Izvestia found out. The tax-free amount of funds is estimated at 16 trillion rubles. Earlier, bloggers were caught in a similar scheme. Thus, the X5 Group's "daughter" underpaid 320 million rubles in taxes under this scheme, and similar claims were made against Magnit's "daughter" — by more than 584 million rubles. Companies use so-called technical firms to reduce VAT and cash out funds. In the first quarter of 2025, a record number of them were opened — 440 pieces.
How companies reduce tax payments
The Federal Tax Service (FTS) has filed a claim against X5 Group's subsidiary, Agro—Auto logistics company, for tax evasion in the amount of 320 million rubles. The court decision entered into force on May 21, 2025, Izvestia reviewed the document.
The decision of the Moscow Arbitration Court, confirmed by the Supreme Court, states that so—called technical companies were used to avoid taxes and withdraw funds - they do not have staff, their vehicles and are used to withdraw money from tax accounting.
The "technicals" are used by businesses to turn it into a multi-stage intermediary scheme to reduce value added tax (VAT), Alexey Kozhevnikov, head of the Risk Control analytical agency, told Izvestia. They are also used to cash out funds, he added.
During the inspections of Agro-Auto, the Federal Tax Service identified about 10 such "technical problems". A significant part of the funds credited to the accounts of these counterparties from Agro-Auto were sent to individuals for the provision of transportation services and were cashed out, as reflected in the court decision. Transportation services were actually provided by individual entrepreneurs, individuals and legal entities who are not tax payers.
With the help of dubious counterparties, the amount of VAT could be reduced by 90-99.99%, the court decision says.
As a result of the investigation, the tax inspectorate added 320.47 million rubles of additional value-added tax to the company. Agro-Auto challenged this decision all the way to the Supreme Court, but it upheld it.
A similar situation occurred with another large trucking company, Celta (a subsidiary of Magnit). Dozens of "technicals" were also found in her activities, which were used to reduce VAT and cash out funds. The court's decision noted that the company created a fictitious document flow in order to obtain unjustified tax benefits. As a result, in December 2024, 584 million rubles were recovered from Celta, excluding fines and penalties.
The press service of Magnit told Izvestia that the Federal Tax Service had filed claims against Celta regarding the application of VAT deductions for contractors who provided transport services to the company. In particular, the Federal Tax Service did not confirm the deductions along the chain of counterparties (subcontractors of the 7th-8th link), since they were not VAT payers. The Federal Tax Service did not dispute the fact of providing transportation services involving hired carriers.
According to Magnit, the tax authority's claims are not systemic in nature, but relate only to individual transactions. All amounts indicated in the decision of the tax authority have been paid in full. The company stressed that in recent years, the company has almost fivefold reduced the use of hired vehicles in its work, focusing on expanding and updating its own fleet.
As Alexey Kozhevnikov told Izvestia, there are, however, much more impressive examples of tax claims and the creation of fictitious counterparties. For example, the Federal Tax Service is collecting more than 799 million rubles from the ATL Regions trucking company from St. Petersburg (legal proceedings are in full swing). And one of the record holders in the number of fictitious counterparties was Quick Line Logistics LLC from St. Petersburg. The Federal Tax Service counted 123 "technicals" from him at a time and charged 235 million rubles in additional taxes, the expert added.
The total amount of tax charges for transport and logistics companies in 2024 amounted to 15.75 billion rubles, and the number of identified "technical problems" remains at an all-time high, Alexey Kozhevnikov noted. In total, in the first quarter of 2025, the Federal Tax Service found 440 such fictitious companies.
According to the Public Consumer Initiative (OPI), more than 240 largest cargo-owning companies with a total turnover of more than 16 trillion rubles act as customers of unscrupulous TLCs. According to the Avtogruzex Association, the number of road carriers operating outside the legal field remains at a consistently high level — more than 60%.
The amount of taxes annually underpaid by the state from the trucking industry reaches 900 billion rubles, Oleg Pavlov, chairman of the OPI, told Izvestia.
"We have written to the head of the Federal Tax Service, Daniil Egorov, and asked him to take the necessary measures to curb unfair practices in the field of road transportation," he said.
Izvestia sent requests to the Federal Tax Service, X5 and Agro-Auto, Celta and other carriers.
The business fragmentation scheme is used not only in trucking, but also in the blogosphere. For example, one of the most high-profile was the criminal case against Elena Blinovskaya. On March 3, 2025, the Savyolovsky District Court of Moscow found her guilty of tax evasion on an especially large scale, money laundering and illegal circulation of funds of payments. According to investigators, in the period from 2019 to 2021, Blinovskaya evaded taxes in the amount of more than 900 million rubles, using business fragmentation schemes. Including penalties and fines, the tax debt amounted to 1.4 billion rubles. She received five years in a general regime penal colony, a fine of 1 million rubles and a ban on commercial activity for five years after her release.
What is "paper" VAT and how taxes are "optimized" for it?
"Most often, Russian carriers optimize income taxes (personal income tax) and insurance premiums when paying salaries," Vadim Filatov, president of the Avtogruzex Association of trucking companies, told Izvestia. — Companies' avoidance of value—added taxes ranks second among the most popular optimization models. For this purpose, the "fuel scheme" is used, in which part of the payment to subcontractors for transportation is carried out not in money, but in fuel, and this transaction is not reflected in the documents. The employer declares that he used up the fuel on his own, due to which he receives a VAT deduction.
Another common way is to purchase the so—called paper VAT, he continued. The company formally pays for services or goods from its counterparties, but in fact the transaction does not involve a real turnover of either goods or services.
Thus, unscrupulous firms artificially inflate expenses in order to reduce the amount of taxes paid, both VAT and income tax, the expert notes.
— The results of the monitoring conducted by the OPI in November 2024 show that more than 50% of transport and logistics companies (TLCs) practice issuing "gray" salaries. Thus, along with insurance premiums, personal income tax amounts are artificially reduced, contributing to a decrease in revenues to regional and local budgets," Oleg Pavlov said.
Drivers who depend on salaries in envelopes are systematically overworking. As a result, violations of the work and rest regime lead to accidents, contribute to a decrease in the popularity of the profession, and provoke an increase in transportation prices, the expert notes.
"Illegal VAT refunds by involving third parties exempt from paying value—added tax and splitting businesses into organizations with different VAT tax regimes are popular among the "gray" schemes," Evgeny Babaev, President of ITECO JSC, told Izvestia. — The share of unofficial wages is also high.
To improve the market situation, it is necessary to ban the creation of carrier companies if they do not have drivers and transport staff, as well as reduce the VAT rate to 10%, the market participant added.
Splitting up businesses to reduce tax payments is used not only in the field of trucking, but also in the construction, catering, marketplace trading and even in the blogosphere, Oleg Pavlov said. The investigation may lead to the initiation of a criminal case, but the degree of punishment depends on many factors, primarily on the amount of damage to the state, the expert added.
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