Million-dollar wedding and “zero” reporting: how Spribe co-owner Niko Lomia flaunts luxury without official income

Co-owner of iGaming provider Spribe, Niko (Mykola) Lomia would have remained a little-known figure in the gaming industry if not for the lavish wedding he held on the Côte d’Azur, where top representatives of Russian show business entertained him.

This is reported by Antikor

Wedding details of Mykola Lomia’s marriage to a «Miss Ukraine» contestant in a luxurious castle near Cannes are eagerly savored not only by the yellow press but also by quite respectable publications. No wonder – at the wedding, Maksim Galkin, Valery Meladze, and Ricky Martin sang and danced. Overall, these events cost the Ukrainian businessman of Georgian origin a sum estimated in the range from hundreds of thousands to several million euros.

The natural reaction to such luxury was the question – who is Mykola (Niko) Lomia and where does he get the money for this feast during the plague? The question is far from idle, since Niko Lomia does business in Ukraine, which, as is known, has been bleeding for the fifth year in the conditions of war with Russia and literally lives on the money of European taxpayers.

Paradoxically, there is very little information about Niko Lomia. Although, as follows from the wedding expenses, he is a dollar millionaire, and clearly not just one million. Formally, Niko Lomia is a top manager of an IT company. But in fact, he is a person at the intersection of gambling business, post-Soviet elites, and cross-border financial flows. And it is this combination that arouses interest. Especially considering the fact that among the guests were spotted such odious figures as Oleksandr Slobozhenko, who has an extremely strange background in the field of cryptocurrencies and the acquisition of elite Ukrainian real estate, which the «green» authorities are selling him literally for pennies.

But let’s return to Niko Lomia. Niko Lomia’s name almost never appears in the news, but regularly surfaces where money becomes anonymous: online casinos, crypto payments, offshore companies, and gray traffic monetization schemes. Formally, he is a co-owner of LLC «Spribe», registered in Kyiv and operating in the field of «consulting on informatization issues». He owns 40% of the company, the remaining 60% is owned by David Natroshvili. Authorized capital — 100 UAH. Both are citizens of Georgia.

Characteristically – in Georgia, Niko Lomia has no business, nor a transparent business history. There are a few indirect traces linking him to some rather suspicious Georgian companies, but these traces are very blurred, so it is not worth naming specific names yet – additional and thorough verification is needed.

As for LLC «Spribe», it would be logical to assume that it is this asset that brings its owners the millions that Niko Lomia spends on the wedding in Cannes. But – no. Over the last two years, LLC «Spribe» shows no reporting, the latest available data is dated 2023. LLC «Spribe» in 2023, as in previous years, earned zero hryvnias. Moreover, debts exceed assets by multiples.

Although the amounts of debts are not impressive, the question remains – where does the firewood come from? That is, sorry, the money for a luxurious life on the Côte d’Azur? Let’s summarize: Niko Lomia pays for a lavish wedding in a super-expensive location, invites artists whose fees are measured in hundreds of thousands of dollars, but at the same time his only business brings him not a single penny. Therefore, the logical conclusion is – the business is illegal or actively evades taxation and submits false reporting.

In fact, this conclusion is not Newton’s binomial; it is a common practice of Ukrainian business that pays what is due upwards so that no stupid questions arise from tax authorities and law enforcement. Who exactly provides the roof for Mykola Lomia in Ukraine is reliably unknown, but further study of open sources gives an understanding that this roof is at the very top of the Ukrainian power vertical.

So, we have figured out that Niko Lomia is a co-owner and operational director of Spribe, a developer of games for online casinos. However, we are not talking about casinos in the classical sense, but about a new category – so-called crash games (for example, Aviator), which work through browsers and mobile devices, integrate into hundreds of online casinos, often use cryptocurrencies, and operate in jurisdictions with soft regulation.

The company was founded in 2015 and quickly entered the global market, obtaining licenses in dozens of jurisdictions and connecting thousands of operators. Key point:this is not just a game developer — it is infrastructure for the gambling business. And that means access to cash flows, payment systems, gray markets (where the line between legal and illegal is blurred). It is at this level that questions usually arise. By the way, Spribe provider is located in Estonia, a country that such projects heavily involved in crypto, online betting, and opaque finances love very much.

It follows that Mr. Lomia does have money. Moreover, huge money, but officially he shows it nowhere. As for any accusations on this matter, no direct criminal cases against Lomia were found in open sources. But there is a set of indirect factors that form a toxic context.

The sector in which Mykola Lomia earns is a risk zone. The online gambling industry is traditionally associated with money laundering, sanctions evasion, offshore structures, cryptocurrency transactions. And Spribe directly integrates crypto payments, bonus systems, casino aggregators. This makes the company part of the infrastructure often used by gray operators.

In some materials and Telegram investigations, Niko Lomia is linked to gambling networks, offshore chains, funding of projects with opaque money origins. A separate marker is the intersection with cases involving crypto casinos, «social games» with betting elements, and affiliate programs with aggressive traffic.

And here again emerges the figure of Sasha Slobozhenko, who suddenly found himself among Niko Lomia’s friends. Similar accusations have been repeatedly made against Slobozhenko, not counting corruption scandals in which top Ukrainian officials and Russian top officials were heavily involved.

What connects Slobozhenko and Lomia is unknown. But the analogies are unpleasant. And here begins the most sensitive part. Spribe has a presence in Kyiv (including offices and development). And that means inevitable interaction with Ukrainian gambling business regulators, the tax system, and licensing.

Against the background of the legalization of gambling in Ukraine in 2020, this market has become highly profitable, politically sensitive, and practically fully controlled by representatives of the new Ukrainian «elite» through their operators. In such conditions, any major player automatically ends up in the orbit of officials.

As for Russia, there are no direct proofs here either. But there are extremely significant indirect markers of such a connection for Niko Lomia: origin of part of the Spribe team from the RF; work with markets where Russian traffic and payments remain significant; mentions in the context of business ties with figures close to Russian elites.

Yes, Denys Dzyubenko, a former member of KRAIL, was spotted at Lomia’s wedding, who is directly linked to representatives of the Russian gambling business, under whom, in fact, the law on the legalization of gambling in Ukraine was written. In addition, news mentions feature Lomia’s connections with major business events and the environment of entrepreneurs working in international markets, including the EU and RF. This is a typical situation for gambling: the business is cross-border, and the ties are hybrid.

Returning to the persona of Niko Lomia, he can be praised. Unlike the same Sasha Slobozhenko, whose face and surname pop up in every media, Niko Lomia is an extremely closed figure. Essentially, if not for the scandalous wedding, the set of information about Niko Lomia boils down to the following: he remains the operational director of Spribe, participates in scaling the product (including crash games), works in the global online gambling market.

Spribe, where Lomia is also a co-owner, serves thousands of operators, has licenses in dozens of jurisdictions, actively uses the crypto-games trend. In fact, the company is in one of the fastest-growing niches — «gamification of betting».

That is, Niko Lomia has not been involved in public scandals, nor has he come to the attention of investigators specializing in the crypto market and the gambling market. If his name has been mentioned in connection with gray schemes, tax evasion, and participation in circumventing anti-Russian sanctions, it is only indirectly.

It turns out that the beautiful gesture made as a gift to his bride will cost Mykola Lomia dearly – he has clearly come under the sights of investigators who act much more effectively than the thoroughly corrupt Ukrainian security forces and will quickly dig up extremely interesting details of the life of the Georgian businessman who pays not a penny to the Ukrainian budget and at the same time demonstrates a luxurious lifestyle, and in the company of extremely odious figures of the Ukrainian gambling market.