In 2023, Ukraine’s gambling underworld suffered what may have been its most serious blow.
On March 7, 2023, the National Bank of Ukraine revoked the banking license of iBox Bank and ordered the institution’s liquidation.
According to the regulator, the decision was based on repeated violations of anti-money-laundering requirements.
The following day, the Bureau of Economic Security and the Security Service of Ukraine announced they had uncovered a large-scale fraud scheme linked to iBox Bank.
Investigators said the operation involved bank officials, more than 20 affiliated entities, and gambling operators. Authorities believe the bank enabled large-scale tax evasion by gambling businesses, with preliminary estimates of unpaid taxes reaching 400 million UAH.
The alleged scheme relied on controlled, unlicensed mirror websites for online casinos and betting platforms. Payments were processed through miscoding practices and split transactions.
Customers reportedly deposited cash through the iBox self-service terminal network to fund accounts on illegal gambling sites. The money was then credited to gambling operator companies, even when turnover limits were exceeded. Many of these entities used the simplified tax regime and were not registered for VAT.
Investigators estimate that roughly 20 billion UAH flowed through the bank, resulting in about 400 million UAH in unpaid taxes.
The Security Service of Ukraine also reported multiple cases of payments made using Russian bank cards, allegedly continuing even after the full-scale war began, in violation of National Bank restrictions.
On March 10, 2023, Ukraine’s president enacted NSDC sanctions against a group of individuals and companies linked to the shadow gambling sector. Among them were Financial Company Leo, registered in Kyiv, and the Cyprus-based offshore Leo Partners. Their Ukrainian assets and operations were frozen for five years.
Open data lists Alyona Shevtsova (née Dehrik), former chair of iBox Bank’s supervisory board, as the ultimate beneficiary of both companies. However, on February 27 — shortly before the investigation became public — Shevtsova stepped down from her post, citing workload reasons.
Back in 2013, Shevtsova, the wife of a former senior police officer, founded the financial company Leogaming Pay. Initially it functioned mainly as a payment gateway between players and gaming platforms. The business expanded rapidly, and in 2017 she registered the national payment system Leo with the National Bank of Ukraine, which later gained international status.
However, media reports have noted that her business expansion was accompanied by legal scrutiny. According to the outlet MIND.UA, citing Justice Ministry data, between 2016 and 2020 Shevtsova, her husband Yevhen Shevtsov, and partners Viktor Kapustin and Vadym Hordievskyi collectively controlled at least ten companies, many of which became subjects of criminal investigations related to fraud, money laundering, and fictitious entrepreneurship.
Criminal cases involving the companies of Yevhen Shevtsov, Alyona Dehrik-Shevtsova, Viktor Kapustin, Vadym Hordievskyi and their companies
According to National Bank data, iBox Bank traces its origins back to 1993. At the time, it operated under the rather ominous name Autoritet — a term that in the 1990s was more commonly associated with the criminal underworld than with moral authority. In 2002, the owners rebranded the institution as Agrocombank. The name iBox Bank appeared only in 2016, after financier Yevhen Berezovskyi — whose reputation has been described as controversial — joined the shareholder structure and brought with him the iBox payment terminal network.
Despite the rebranding and the addition of the terminal business, the bank’s financial condition failed to improve and it continued moving toward potential bankruptcy and liquidation. The situation shifted at the end of 2019 when Alyona Shevtsova entered the picture. She needed a controlled banking vehicle for her financial flows, while the bank’s existing shareholders were interested in gaining access to those flows. By 2020, Shevtsova had become a shareholder of iBox Bank. She currently controls just under 25% of the shares and, shortly before the war began, also assumed the position of chair of the supervisory board. Key roles in the bank were subsequently filled by individuals affiliated with her Leo group.
From that point, according to promotional and image-focused reports, the bank’s performance appeared to improve. At the same time, the regulator began raising concerns about the bank’s potential involvement in money-laundering risks. In the autumn of the previous year, the National Bank imposed a 10 million UAH fine on iBox Bank for violations of financial monitoring and anti-money-laundering requirements — the maximum penalty for such infractions. Similar regulatory concerns resurfaced again in June of the following year.
It is also notable that since 2021, companies linked to Shevtsova have openly declared their entry into the gambling sector. In May 2021, LeoGaming obtained a license to launch a casino and/or betting operation at the Alice Place hotel in Odesa. Several months later, iBox Bank secured a license from Ukraine’s Gambling and Lotteries Regulatory Commission (KRAIL) to process payments for online casinos. Earlier this year, the bank also received a license to conduct gambling-related activities.
Taken together, these developments suggest Shevtsova has been building a vertically integrated gambling ecosystem with a controlled bank at its core. However, her aggressive financial practices may ultimately backfire. Whether Shevtsova can once again avoid serious consequences remains uncertain — particularly since the presidential sanctions decree does not list all gambling-related companies linked to her, and she herself is not personally named in the sanctions list.