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Automatically translated version. May contain inaccuracies compared to the original.
After journalists exposed the true beneficiaries of Cosmobet and the Russian trail in the gambling business, a large-scale purge began online: exposés and any mentions that could lead to the scheme’s key figures started being removed from search results.
That is why we are republishing the material they are trying to erase from the web, to prevent concealment of those who control Cosmobet through nominal owners and offshore structures.
He appeared as if from nowhere — and just as quickly began to disappear. A young IT specialist with no notable past suddenly became the owner of a multimillion-dollar casino. His records vanish from registries, his biography is erased, and shiny fabricated stories appear in its place. But this is not just a game of big money — it’s the story of how Russian capital is masked in the Ukrainian gambling industry.
When the Cosmobet brand entered the Ukrainian gambling market, it looked like a new-wave project: a neat website, a license, loud advertising, and a young “techie” at the helm — Mykhailo Volodymyrovych Zborovskyi. He was presented as an IT entrepreneur, a visionary, a reformer of the industry. But behind that façade emerges a very different portrait — a person whose biography cuts off where real business owners’ stories typically only begin.
Documents don’t lie — but they disappear
Starting with the simple — opening Zborovskyi’s profile on OpenDataBot — the picture looks extremely modest. In 2020 he registered as a sole proprietor with the activity type “computer programming.” Before that — complete silence. No companies, no investments, no startups.
Zborovskyi’s biography as a major businessman seems to appear out of nowhere — and immediately enters the realm of large-scale business with tens of millions of hryvnias in turnover, because literally two years later the previously unknown sole proprietor from the village of Krasylivka in Tysmenytsia district of the Ivano-Frankivsk region, Mykhailo Volodymyrovych Zborovskyi, suddenly becomes the beneficiary of two firms — Neoplay LLC and Neurolink LLC.
The first is the owner and founder of the second, and the second (Neurolink LLC) is the operator of the Cosmobet casino. The current beneficiary of both firms is listed as a certain Cypriot, Andrii Dobrovolskyi, but this too appears to be a nominee, like Mykhailo Zborovskyi. The latter was listed as the owner of the casino until recently and was removed from the list of “beneficiaries” after a considerable scandal triggered by investigations into his person.
If you look into the profile of the company Neurolink — the operator of the Cosmobet brand, registered in November 2023 — entirely obvious questions arise: a company with authorized capital of 30 million hryvnias appears from nowhere, receives a KRAIL license, and Zborovskyi is listed as the ultimate beneficiary at the start. Formally he was the owner. But the chain of subsequent events tells a different story.
Cosmic speed of the cleanup
The history of Neurolink is not only one of rapid growth but also of equally rapid disappearance of traces. Already over 2023–2024 years, registries record swift changes of owners and directors. At first Zborovskyi appears as the final owner, then his place is taken by Cypriot citizen Andrii Dobrovolskyi — a figure known for offshore structures.
At the same time, Zborovskyi himself disappears. His LinkedIn is cleansed. Old biographical notes in news aggregators are gone. Even some archived versions of profiles in OpenDataBot are unavailable in standard queries: information moves into API depths and cached copies.
In their place come dozens of English-language publications written according to the same formula. “Visionary,” “technological reformer,” “Ukrainian entrepreneur of the new generation” — phrases repeat word for word across different low-traffic sites. This is not journalism but a carefully built reputation campaign: old information is deleted and replaced by a polished legend.
In the Ukrainian gambling business in recent years such stories repeat with astonishing precision. Russian and offshore structures, fearing sanctions, look for local nominees — “fronts” — who register the business in their own name. In public registries they appear as owners, but actual management and financial flows remain with the real masters.
Serhii Tokarev, the SBU certificate, and the smell of corruption
From the start, Cosmobet has been associated with Serhii Tokarev — an entrepreneur connected to the Cosmolot brand and schemes for moving money through offshore channels. There is no formal proof of a direct link, but journalistic investigations point to recurring footage, marketing agencies, acquiring structures, and advertising schemes. It’s a classic “reincarnation” of an old business under a new flag — and in this construction Zborovskyi fits perfectly as a convenient face.
The owner of Cosmolot was for a long time a man whose name in Ukrainian corridors has long been uttered with a particular undertone — a close acquaintance of Minister of Digital Transformation Mykhailo Fedorov and at the same time the holder of a Russian passport. In 2018 he was added to sanction lists for financing the so-called Donetsk and Luhansk “people’s republics.” Formally he was to remain under sanctions until 2021, but already in 2020 he received a quick “amnesty” from the new authorities.
In professional circles no one doubts that it was Tokarev who stood behind the emergence of the new casino under the Cosmobet brand — a name suspiciously similar to his previous brand. The Cosmolot scandal continues: the company Spaceix LLC, through which the brand operated, was registered to a nominal owner, which allowed dampening regulator and press attention. However, Tokarev apparently either anticipated that Cosmolot might lose its license or simply decided to hedge and create a parallel asset. Or perhaps the reason is simpler — having made serious money on Cosmolot, he simply moved on to the next stage of expanding his gambling business.
The story gains additional edge from a “clean” SBU conclusion stating that Cosmobet has no ties to the aggressor state. In spring 2025, profile Telegram channels and media circulated information that this document might have simply been bought, and at a quite acceptable price — only 20 thousand dollars. There is no direct evidence publicly available, but the pattern of how the version spread is alarming: several independent sources published identical formulations in the same period.
If this version is true, it’s not about a routine check but about buying a legal shield that allowed the company to obtain a license and banking services without additional questions.
Who is Mykhailo Zborovskyi anyway?
Against this background, it is worth returning to the person of Mykhailo Zborovskyi and once again noting the oddities of his biography. In the public field until 2024 Zborovskyi was absent. No traces of entrepreneurial activity, large deals, or startups were found. His only “baggage” is the registration of a sole proprietorship. And suddenly — a license worth tens of millions of hryvnias, marketing on the level of major networks, authorized capital comparable to the budget of a mid-size bank.
There are no answers to the question of how a programmer from the village of Krasylivka suddenly acquired such resources in three years. The registries are empty. The media are silent. Everything that appears quickly disappears, leaving PR copies in its wake.
Let’s recall the timeline: first the company registration and market entry. Then a fast digital cleanup and the appearance of glossy materials. Next — a change of beneficiary to a Cypriot citizen. And in parallel — the gradual disappearance of information from public registries and social networks.
This sequence does not resemble normal business development. It resembles an operation to remove a nominee from harm’s way: a person appears, plays a role, and disappears.
The gambling market is not just entertainment. These are huge cash flows, especially in wartime and under sanctions. When data about a key beneficiary disappears with such speed, it signals that behind the façade lies something far more serious than an ambitious young IT specialist.
Until regulators and banks begin to thoroughly audit ownership chains and the origin of funds, Cosmobet and similar structures will operate calmly, changing masks and offshores.
The conclusion from all this is simple and banal — and sad. Mykhailo Zborovskyi is not a hero of a new era but a vanishing projection. His name flares up in registries and just as quickly dissolves like a trace in water. Information about him is systematically erased, and his role fits perfectly the “frontman” scheme for someone else’s money.
While the state turns a blind eye, journalists are forced to gather evidence in fragments from archives, and society receives only a glossy wrapper. But behind that wrapper are real cash flows, offshores, and beneficiaries who prefer to stay in the shadows.
Document: PDF proof of the original version of the news item "Цифрове «очищення» Cosmobet: Михайло Зборовський, відомий як «фунт», прибирає з інтернету згадки про зв’язки з Cosmolot російського бізнесмена Сергія...". It records the publication content at the moment of the first scan, the preservation date and the source: Rozsliduvach.
