The Vietnamese Ministry of Public Security on Tuesday announced the arrest of two Ukrainian suspects for operating usury services through mobile apps and websites, offering annual interest rates of up to 2,000 percent.

It is estimated that Bugaevskiy Tymur, 34, and Kravchuk Iryna, 39, both Ukrainian nationals, have illicitly earned trillions of Vietnamese dong through this operation. (VND1 trillion = US$40.08 million)

The ministry recently discovered that these two suspects are part of a group of foreign criminals collaborating with Vietnamese associates to run shadow businesses. 

They employed advanced technology to conduct large-scale illegal loan-sharking operations with interest rates as high as 2,000 percent annually.

Following evidence collection, authorities apprehended Tymur and Iryna upon their entry into Vietnam to oversee usury enterprises. 

Simultaneously, investigative teams conducted raids on four companies in Ho Chi Minh City. 

The investigation identified Katerynchyk Roman, a 38-year-old Ukrainian, as the mastermind, though he had already fled Vietnam. 

Roman, along with Le Thanh Huynh Cang, 53, and Nguyen Thi Nhat Phuong, 34, collaborated to provide usury services through mobile apps like Easycash and Oncredit, as well as the Oncredit website. 

Since 2019, Roman has invested $400,000 for Cang to establish financial and lending firms, with $11 million added in 2023, sourced from Singapore’s SCA Company and Cyprus’s TAS Bank. 

Cang and his Vietnamese accomplices managed loan approvals ranging from VND500,000 ($20) to tens of millions of Vietnamese dong (VND10 million = $400), amassing hundreds of thousands of Vietnamese customers. 

Currently, authorities have summoned 63 individuals for their involvement and have seized 68 laptops, nearly 100 mobile phones, and various related items and documents. 

Police are still probing the case.

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