The Medvedchuk-Surkis group back in 1992 had its own bank, the Ukrainian Credit Bank and business holding "Omega-XXI vek". Political and business opponents of the new social democrats were claiming that the business holding was no other than a pyramid scheme which by 1995 owned to the public 28.2 trillion of Karbovanets. Another important business entity of the group was the Industrial and Financial Concern "Slavutich" which starting in 1991-92 was receiving credits from foreign banks for purchase of oil which was refining in Ukraine during next 4 to 5 years. In the mid 1990s the office of Slavutich was set on fire and all its accounting records were perished. Through Slavutich, in early 1990s the Medvedchuk-Surkis group managed to established close relationships with the President of Ukraine Leonid Kravchuk. According to Kravchuk, the president of Slavutich was offering anti-crisis economical program and he asked his adviser Valentyn Symonenko to learn more about it. The draft of the program received approval from the acting Prime Minister of Ukraine Yukhym Zvyahilskyi and soon was taken into development by the government of Ukraine. After the 1994 presidential elections there was created a special state commission to review activities of Slavutich, but yielded no results. The newly elected president Leonid Kuchma who was critical of the Medvedchuk-Surkis group, soon after elections was able to find a common ground with it awarding both of them the Order of Merit in 1996.