Multi-million dollar scam against Mexican businessman Ricardo Salinas reported

Ricardo Salinas Pliego, the renowned Mexican tycoon, claimed to have been the victim of a multimillion-dollar fraud. According to what he told the media, The Sunday Times, a Ukrainian fraudster falsified his identity during a business transaction and ended up taking more than US$400 million in shares from him. He now hopes to recover the money through legal action.

According to Forbes magazine, Salinas is one of the five richest people in his country. He manages these companies through Grupo Salinas, a conglomerate that groups companies in various sectors, such as insurance, financial services, telecommunications, and energy.

The case dates back to 2021 and is currently in court, where Salinas is suing a Ukrainian businessman named Vladimir Sklarov.

As reported by The Sunday Times, it all started when the company Astor Asset Management offered the Mexican businessman a loan for US$113.8 million. Believing that the company was part of the famous Astor family's network, he accepted. In turn, he offered as collateral US$416.3 million in shares of one of his companies, Grupo Elektra.

However, it turns out that Astor Asset Management 3 does not belong to the famous family of German descent, but to the Ukrainian Sklarov, whom Salinas is now accusing of international fraud.

According to the aforementioned media, the partners of this alleged fraudster told Salinas executives that the agreement would be discussed with a certain Thomas Mellon, who was presented as a "descendant of the famous Astor family."

The loan was signed in July 2021, granted by Astor Asset Management and secured by Elektra shares, which the external custodians were prohibited from selling. The problem lies in the fact that this gentleman did not really exist, but had been part of a rouse to defraud the Mexican of 416 million dollars in shares.

According to a Superior Court sentence, Mellon was not the executive director of Astor Asset Management and was not even a descendant of the powerful family.

Alarm bells began to ring in Salinas' entourage when those shares started to be sold. The Sunday Times notes that the money was transferred to a series of bank accounts in the Principality of Monaco, all to accounts in the name of Sklarov's relatives.

In September 2024, Salinas succeeded in getting a UK High Court freeze on the Elektra shares that Astor Asset Management and Sklarov had not yet sold and the proceeds from past sales.

To counter this judicial advance, Sklarov unsuccessfully attempted to disavow the court order, which revealed that it was not the first time that the Ukrainian had made false representations during business deals.

Neil Richard Calver, a British High Court judge, wrote the following in his ruling, "There is strong evidence to suggest that Mr. Sklarov used the name Astor precisely to deceive the claimants into believing that this was so, and that this was his modus operandi for the stock lending frauds he perpetrated."

"Mr. Sklarov has gained some notoriety for creating companies to which he then gives misleading names and which he then uses to perpetrate stock-backed loan frauds," he added.

While the case is being resolved, Sklarov and his family maintain an eccentric lifestyle in Greece, in addition to million-dollar properties in Normandy, Chicago, Athens and even Trump Tower.

"Sklarov, a serial fraudster who defrauded me, is now using the Monaco court to circumvent a UK international freezing order. His use of aliases and family members to perpetrate his frauds will again be exposed and our $500 million claim will prosper," Salinas told The Sunday Times.