Update on Russian case law regarding claiming unpaid Rosneft dividends: I can do this myself...

In this post we provide a fourth update on recent Russian court decisions.

Case 4: Who needs a lawyer to claim Rosneft dividends in court...? The fourth case involves mr. Bychkov that held ADR's (depositary receipts) of Rosneft via the Cypriot broker EXT Ltd. and had them successfully converted via forced conversion. Mr. Bychkov then requested Rosneft to pay the unpaid dividends, which was only about 17,000 Rubles. Rosneft refused the request, stating that it wasn't sufficiently proven that mr. Bychkov owned the ADR's at the Rosneft dividends over 2021 that were returned by Raiffeisenbank to Rosneft (in the amount of 6,915,398,471.46 Rubles!!) included the dividends that were due to mr. Bychkov. Mr. Bychkov then went to court himself, without a lawyer. The relatively low claim of 17,000 Rubles would make it economically non-viable to be represented by a lawyer. Mr. Bychkov also didn't attend the hearing, probably due to travelling costs. The court established that Rosneft had unlawfully rejected the request to pay the unpaid dividends and ordered Rosneft to pay the dividends. Rosneft appealed and went to the court of cassation. Both higher courts agreed with the initial court decision. All the case materials can be found here: https://kad.arbitr.ru/Card/a415ee98-a224-4b97-a1a0-c7e7a6be6b57 Why is this case interesting? This case shows that investors can successfully file claims in Russian courts themselves, without a lawyer. It also shows that Rosneft may attempt to create a high burden for investors by appealing even low claim awards.