A New Rochelle woman who set up the U.S. office of a German-Swiss financial services company and landed a big contract says the mostly male firm shunted her aside and then fired her because she got pregnant.
Anna Belchikov accused XTP AG and XTP Implementation Services Inc. of discrimination, in an Oct. 18 complaint filed in U.S. District Court, White Plains.
Almost immediately after she told executives that she was pregnant, she claims, management “started targeted attacks intended to undermine her and to make her work experience unbearable.”
The alleged attacks included replacing her with a man, demoting her, cutting off communication with top management and denying her promised compensation.
XTP takes a percentage of the savings it negotiates for pension plans and large investment groups on the fees their clients pay on investments.
XTP hired Belchikov in 2016 to set up a U.S. office. She had graduated with a MBA in finance from the Wharton School and had worked in finance for nearly 20 years in New York, London and Zurich.
She was hired as a consultant through a boutique private equity advisory firm she had established in 2013, for $126,000 a year and a 15% commission on all North American income.
The consulting contract was used to “masquerade” a U.S. presence while evading payroll taxes, according to the complaint. Her consulting firm paid the taxes.
Functionally, the complaint states, Belchikov was an XTP employee and the head of XTP US, an affiliate that was later renamed XTP Implementation Services.
She owned 100% of XTP US, the complaint states, with the understanding that the parent company would acquire majority ownership once she landed their first client.
In 2018, a major state pension plan signed with XTP. The complaint does not identify the client, but public records indicate that the North Dakota State Investment Board hired XTP.
Belchikov told XTP executives in June of that year that she was pregnant and would take a maternity leave in November.
Before the maternity leave began, an executive chairman and a chief financial officer were placed in the U.S. office, according to the complaint, without her approval or consultation.
The firm allegedly stalled her on a new employment agreement but increased her base pay by 50%.
When she returned from maternity leave in early 2020, she was told that she had to report to the new executive chairman and she was no longer head of the North American business, purportedly because she could not keep up the pace with a new child to care for.
Her new boss also allegedly criticized her for poor performance, “in spite of the fact that Belchikov was responsible for 100%” of XTP’s North America sales.
When she protested her demotion, her complaint was allegedly seen as insubordination and as “not towing the line.”
On July 2, 2020, she was fired.
She claims she has not been paid the 15% commissions ”” worth “hundreds of thousands, if not millions, of dollars” ”” that had been promised.
She accuses the firm of pregnancy discrimination, gender discrimination, caregiver status discrimination, retaliation, unjust enrichment and misappropriation of her labors without promised compensation.
The complaint also names three senior executives as defendants: Wolfram Klinger, the founder; Philipp Henrich, the chief executive officer, and Nikolai Dordrechter, the chief operating officer.
Attempts to contact XTP for its side of the story failed.
Belchikov is represented by Manhattan attorney Brian C. Dunning.
