Contribee, a crowdfunding platform, is currently embroiled in a scandal that is seeing digital creators and non-governmental platforms leave its service. What’s behind it?
One of Contribee’s shareholders and then director Gediminas Ratkevičius had taken 130,000 euros from the company’s accounts that belonged to Blue/Yellow, Lithuania’s largest Ukraine-aid organisation.
Disputes are also brewing between those who wanted to gain control of the company – the lawyer and investor Gintaras Černiauskas, the social activist and founder of Laisvės TV Andrius Tapinas, and the head of Coinvest Capital Viktorija Trimbel.
On August, 9, the news website Delfi first broke the story about an ongoing pre-trial investigation into Contribee by the Kaunas Regional Prosecutor’s Office. The publication named Ratkevičius as the accused, but gave no further details.
On August 10, Tapinas said on Facebook that he already knew about Contribee’s problems. Laisvės Media Group, which he owns, had also offered to buy the shares of Ratkevičius and the current head of Contribee, Adrijus Jakučionis. Tapinas said they did not reach the deal and that Laisvės TV was now pulling out of Contribee.
On August 11, a YouTube post by the blogger Skirmantas Malinauskas accused Tapinas of trying to take over Contribee.
“He goes to the shareholders and says: either we, the biggest customers, pull out and you will be in big trouble, or you sell your business to us on our terms,” Malinauskas said. Tapinas replied on Facebook that Malinauskas was “manipulating emotions”.
On August 12, Malinauskas revealed that Ratkevičius had taken 130,000 euros from the Blue/Yellow account on Contribee, which made the story explode nationwide.
Most of the subsequent talk shows and articles focused on Tapinas and Malinauskas, as well as Contribee’s representatives Jakučionis, the company’s attorneys Gintaras Černiauskas and Laura Daumantaitė, and investor Viktorija Trimbel.
LRT RADIO, Delfi, and 15min also revealed that the funds were returned to Blue/Yellow on January 26, around a month after Ratkevičius had taken them. However, the returned funds were provided by G. Č. Investicijos, the company of the former director’s lawyer, G. Černiauskas, and not the director of Contribee himself.
The lawyer’s spouse and one of the main shareholders of the investment company, Laura Daumantaitė, said that the former Contribee director had previously mortgaged his house to them. G. Č. Investicijos thus provided the loan, and the house of Ratkevičius was transferred to them. According to her, he was now paying interest on it every month.
According to the data of Lithuania’s Real Estate Register, the former director of Contribee Ratkevičius did own a part of a semi-detached residential house in Kaunas, and the property currently belongs to G. Č. Investicijos.
Journalists also revealed that the funds taken by the former Contribee director were returned to Blue/Yellow as part of a loan to himself. This is now subject to an ongoing pre-trial investigation.
It has not yet been established what Ratkevičius used the stolen funds for.
Prosecutor General Nida Grunskienė told journalists at the parliament on Tuesday that the investigation, launched on January 7, is being carried out under two articles of the Criminal Code – embezzlement and fraudulent bookkeeping. “To my knowledge, no suspicions have been brought against anyone,” she said.
Contribee UAB was established in Kaunas in 2020. From July 2020 to December 21, 2023, the company was headed by Ratkevičius, followed by Mantas Michalauskas for several months. From March 1, 2023, it has been headed by Jakučionis.
In 2021, Contribee received investments from two venture capital funds totalling 250,000 euros.
Journalists also found that there was an attempt earlier this year to take over the controlling shares of Jakučionis and Ratkevičius. Viktorija Trimbel, head of Coinvest Capital that invested 120,000 euros in Contribee and owns 10.5 percent of the shares, said she wanted the other owners to let go of their shares.
“They must withdraw and sell the shares at a [nominal] price,” she told Delfi.
According to the Register of Legal Entities, the nominal value of a Contribee's share is 0.25 euros. Jakučionis owns 3,971 shares and Ratkevičius 3,822. Under Trimbel’s terms, they would both be paid 1,948.25 euros.
Meanwhile, the company’s lawyer and investor Černiauskas said that he was willing to pay almost 500,000 for the shares held by Trimbel’s Coinvest Capital, the former director Michalauskas, and other minority shareholders.
Meanwhile, Tapinas from Laisvės TV offered Jakučionis and Ratkevičius 10,000 euros each for their majority share of 61.86 percent, as well as to cover the company’s 73,000-euro debt to the state. However, they rejected the deal, according to the blogger Malinauskas.
“The right price [is] around 400,000 euros,” said Jakučionis.
Contribee earned a profit of 52,960 euros in 2023 and generated revenues of around 288,700 euros, he told BNS news agency.
Contribee’s most recent financial statement is for 2021 when it had a revenue of 26,900 euros and losses of 51,000 euros.
Content creators leave the platform
As a result of the scandal, Contribee has already been abandoned by Laisvės TV, Redakcija, Dailius Dargis and Siena. Some other clients say they are still monitoring the situation.
A meeting of Contribee’s shareholders is scheduled for August 21, where Ratkevičius – who is being accused of taking the funds – intends to ask permission to sell his shares.
According to Daumantaitė, the other attorney of Contribee, it depends on whether the investors will allow Ratkevičius to sell his shares. Trimbel, the head of Coinvest Capital, said the green light would depend on the offer the former director would make.
“When we receive an application for a specific transaction, we will of course consider and evaluate it,” she said. “So far, we have received only one referral for what we consider to be a sham transaction because it referred to a buyer who had formally renounced his intention to buy [the shares].”
According to Jakučionis, the current director of Contribee, talks are underway with another unnamed potential buyer.
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