The number of officials who have declared cryptocurrencies has doubled in a year. One of the largest crypto millionaires among politicians is Mykyta Kuzkevych, a deputy of the Odesa Regional Council, who declared 121 BTC, which is currently equal to more than UAH 195 million, reports 
with reference to the digital service for analysing state data “Opendatabot”.
It is worth noting that the declarants submit their assets both in hryvnia equivalent and simply by indicating the number of cryptocurrency units in their possession.
“Having analysed a large number of declarations, first of all, it is worth noting their poor quality. It seems that officials spend 5 minutes on declarations on the last day of submission. Despite the fact that there is already a special section where it is necessary to indicate assets in crypto, almost all crypto holdings are filled in differently, with errors and in different parts of the declarations,”
– said Oleksiy Ivankin, founder of Opendatabot.
In the 2022 declarations, the most popular cryptocurrencies among Ukrainian officials were Bitcoin (BTC), Ethereum (ETH), and the Tether cryptocurrency (USDT).
Bitcoin
In 2021, the largest amount of bitcoin was declared by Anna Pozdnyakova, Director of the Odesa City Heat Supply Utility, which amounted to UAH 53 million. A year later, the deputy head of the Dnipro Regional State Administration, Sergiy Karpenko, took over the top spot. He owns bitcoins equivalent to UAH 41 million.
The largest amount of bitcoins in 2022 – 121 BTC – was declared by the deputy of the Odesa Regional Council, Nikita Kuzkevich. At the time of publication, this amounted to over UAH 195 million in hryvnia equivalent.
Top 5 bitcoin holders in Ukrainian politics:
- Kuzkevych Mykyta Dmytrovych, Deputy of Odesa Regional Council – 121
- Ivan Ivanov, First Deputy Head of Polissya Customs, State Customs Service – 102
- Kizlyar Oleksandr Oleksandrovych, Member of Khmelnytskyi District Council – 100
- Bondarenko Oleh Volodymyrovych, Chairman of the Committee on Environmental Policy and Nature Management of the Verkhovna Rada of Ukraine – 80
- Oleksiy Volodymyrovych Kucher, Head of the State Regulatory Service of Ukraine – 77
Ethereum
Sergiy Karpenko, the official from Dnipro region who declared the largest amount of bitcoins, has also held the record for the amount of ethereum for two years in a row. In his declarations for 2021 and 2022, the official noted that he owned the same amount of the equivalent for this cryptocurrency – UAH 14.6 million.
Top 5 Ethereum holders in Ukrainian politics:
- Osipov Ihor Volodymyrovych, Deputy of the Podil District Council of Odesa Oblast – 1800
- Kizlyar Oleksandr Oleksandrovych, Member of Khmelnytskyi District Council – 1000,
- Kyslyy Vitaliy Viktorovych, Head of the Department for Supervision over the Observance of Laws by Territorial Police Bodies in the Course of Pre-trial Investigation of the Kyiv City Prosecutor’s Office – 893,
- Pavliv Rostyslav Yosypovych, Director of the State Enterprise Stryi Forestry – 659,
- Kristina Pavlova, Chief Specialist of the Municipal Economy Division of the City Improvement Directorate of the Department of Improvement and Infrastructure of the Dnipro City Council – 130.
Cryptocurrency/Tether (USDT)
Vitaliy Brovko, Deputy Head of the Department of the Prosecutor General’s Office, declared the most crypto dollars or stablecoins in 2021 – 774,500 units. The same official also holds the record for the largest amount in equivalent – UAH 20 million.
The official also held the top spot among the declarants for 2022. The number of crypto dollars in his possession did not change, but their value increased to more than UAH 29 million.
At the same time, the largest amount of crypto dollars/stablecoins was declared by Maksym Kyselyov, Director of the State Enforcement Service Department of the Ministry of Justice of Ukraine, who earned UAH 25 million.
Top 5 crypto-dollar holders in Ukrainian politics:
- Brovko Vitaliy Mykolayovych, Deputy Head of Department of the Prosecutor General’s Office – 774500
- Kiselev Maksym Yevhenovych, Director of the State Enforcement Service Department of the Ministry of Justice of Ukraine – 702172
- Khmelnikov Artem Oleksandrovych, Member of the Dnipro City Council – 114646
- Gashenko Ivan Anatoliiovych, Member of Zaporizhzhia Regional Council – 76550
- Grenadiorova Kateryna Volodymyrivna, court registrar of the Kyiv District Court of Odesa – 60106.
The biggest losses in crypto
It is also worth noting that there are several officials who declared their crypto assets but indicated that they had lost access to them.
380.95 bitcoins, a record amount among Ukrainian officials, were declared and lost by Roman Saramaga, Deputy Head of the State Service of Geology and Subsoil of Ukraine, in 2021. In hryvnia terms, at the time of publication, this is about UAH 615 million.
The largest amount of ethereum – 1,800 units or more than UAH 160 million – belongs to Ihor Osipov, a deputy of the Podil District Council of Odesa Oblast. In 2021 and 2022, the official stated in his declarations that he had lost access to cryptocurrency.
Resumption of declaration
Since the beginning of the full-scale invasion of Russia, the mandatory verification of officials’ declarations has been temporarily cancelled. Despite this, the obligation of officials to regularly report on their property status and any changes in it remains unchanged.
on 12 October 2023, the Law on the Restoration of Declarations came into force. At the same time, the declaration campaign for 2021-2022 was launched and lasted until 31 January 2024. Ukrainian officials had to catch up with the missing declarations for the previous period (2021-2022) by the end of January.
It should be noted that the deadline for submitting declarations for 2023 remains unchanged – until April 2024.
Earlier, the NABU and the SAPO notified a current member of the Ukrainian parliament of suspicion of entering false information in his 2020 electronic declaration. In 2020, he declared cryptocurrency with a market value of over UAH 24 million.