Arkady Romanovich Rotenberg (Russian:Аркадий Романович Ротенберг; born 15 December 1951) is a Russianbillionaire businessman andoligarch. With his brotherBoris Rotenberg, he was co-owner of theStroygazmontazh (S.G.M. group), the largest construction company for gas pipelines and electrical power supply lines in Russia.
In 2023Forbes estimated Rotenberg's wealth at $3.5 billion.[2] He is a close confidant, business partner, and childhood friend of presidentVladimir Putin.[3][4][5] Rotenberg became a billionaire through lucrative state-sponsored construction projects and oil pipelines.[6] ThePandora Papers leak implicated Rotenberg in facilitating and maintaining elaborate networks of offshore wealth for Russian political and economic elites.[6]
Rotenberg isJewish.[10][11] He was born in 1951 inLeningrad, where his father, Roman, worked in management at the Red Dawn telephone factory, allowing the family to avoid living in acommunal apartment.[12][13][14] In 1963, when he was age twelve, Rotenberg andVladimir Putin both joined Anatoly Rakhlin'ssambo club.[12][15]
In 1978, Rotenberg graduated from theLesgaft National State University of Physical Education, Sport and Health and became ajudo trainer.[12] After Putin returned to Russia in 1990, Rotenberg trained with him several times a week.[5][12][15] During the 1990s, Rotenberg and his brother, Boris, who had moved toFinland, traded in petroleum products.[12] When Putin became vice-mayor, Rotenberg secured funding fromGennady Timchenko to found Yavara-Neva, a professional judo club.[12] Later, after the club won nineEuropean Judo Championships and trained four Olympic champions, it was given a new state-funded $180 million facility, including a thousand-seat arena and a yacht club.[12]
In 2000, Putin, who had becomePresident of Russia, created Rosspirtprom, a state-owned enterprise controlling 30% of Russia'svodka market, and put Rotenberg in control.[12] In 2001, Rotenberg and his brother founded theSMP bank (Russian:банк «Северный морской путь»), which operates in 40 Russian cities with over 100 branches, more than half of them in theMoscow area.[5] SMP oversees the operation of more than 900ATM-machines. SMP bank also became a leading large-diameter gas pipe supplier.[12]
Gazprom often appears to have paid Rotenberg inflated prices. In 2007, Gazprom rejected an earlier plan to build a 350-mile pipeline and instead paid Rotenberg $45 billion, 300% of ordinary costs, to build a 1,500 mile pipeline to theArctic Circle.[12] In 2008, Rotenberg formedStroygazmontazh (SGM) with five companies he had purchased from Gazprom for $348 million.[12] In 2009, the company earned over $2 billion in revenue.[12]
Rotenberg then bought Northern Europe Pipe Project, which eventually supplied 90% of Gazprom's large diameter pipes and operated at a 30% profit margin, twice the industry average.[12] In 2013, Gazprom increased Rotenberg's contract for aKrasnodar pipeline by 45%, then continued payments for a year after the Bulgarian segment was canceled.[12]
Rotenberg is the president of theHockey Club Dynamo Moscow. In 2013, he became a member of the committee of theInternational Judo Federation.[18] In preparation for the2014 Winter Olympics inSochi, Rotenberg won contracts worth $7 billion, including a $2 billion coastal highway and an underwater gas pipeline that came in at 300% more than average costs.[12]
In 2013, Rotenberg became the chairman of theEnlightenment Publishing House [ru], which had once been the biggest supplier for textbooks in the Soviet Union. After Enlightenment became a private company in 2011, the government of the Russian Federation started to make several changes in that sector. In 2013, an internal council was formed by the Ministry of Education to check all textbooks. Many of Enlightenment's competitors' books did not pass this new evaluation, and so Enlightenment won about 70% of the contracts for new textbooks in the Russian Federation in 2014.[3]
As a result of the sanctions,Visa andMasterCard stopped servicing SMP Bank.[12] In September 2014, Italy seized €30 million of Rotenberg's real estate, including four villas inSardinia andTarquinia, and a hotel inRome.[12] The U.S added Arkady and Igor Rotenberg on their blacklist of Russian oligarchs, freezing assets for US$65 million in 2014.[33] In November 2016, theGeneral Court of the European Union confirmed the sanctions against Russia and the freezing of Arkady's funds which had taken effect on 30 July 2014, but limited to the new properties added by theEU Council in March 2015.[34]
The RussianState Duma then proposed a bill, known as theRotenberg Law, allowing sanctioned Russians to get compensated by the state, but it was declined.[3][36]
In July 2020, a report by the United States Committee on Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs determined that companies linked to Rotenberg had evaded sanctions by purchasing more than $18 million in art in between May and November 2014.[38] The purchases were made months after he was sanctioned by the US Treasury Department.[39]
Press research, published in June 2023, showed that Rotenberg had financed the purchase of a mansion inKitzbühel, Austria back in 2013. Rotenberg's firmOlpon Investments, located inCyprus, sent some €11.5 million to theMeridian Trade Bank inLatvia from where it was lent to the Cyprus-basedWayblue Investments Limited. Wayblue concluded the purchase in Austria and was still listed as owner of the property in 2023. In 2017 the loan itself was transferred from the Latvian bank toCresco Securities inEstonia. A Cresco representative claimed in 2023, that the loan was never paid back to them.[45]Since Austrian authorities were not able to identify the owners ofWayblue Investments Limited, no legal action was taken. According to local witnesses, Vladimir Putin's daughterMaria Vorontsova stayed in the house on a regular basis.[46][47]
Rotenberg's personal wealth has been estimated in July 2021 at $2.9 billion.[18] He used to own a 2009Bombardier Global 5000 (registered M-BRRB), however he was forced to sell it due to the sanctions placed upon him.[48] He owns a 2011 Benetti 65 meter yacht namedRahil.[49] The yacht can accommodate ten guests in seven staterooms.[50]
In 2005, Rotenberg married his second wifeNatalia Rotenberg. Their two children live in the United Kingdom with Natalia.[53] They divorced in 2015 in the U.K. While the financial details of the divorce are private, the agreement includes division of the use of a £35 million Surrey mansion and a £8 million apartment in London. The couple's lawyers obtained a secrecy order preventing media in the U.K. from reporting on the divorce. The order was overturned on appeal.[54]
His older three children includeIgor (Russian:Игорь Аркадьевич; born 9 September 1974), who is a Russian billionaire businessman.[55] His daughter Liliya (Russian:Лилия Аркадьевна; born 17 April 1978) is a doctor. His son Paul (Russian:Павел Аркадьевич; born 29 February 2000), is a competitive hockey player.[56]
According to theBBC, Arkady Rotenberg says he is the owner ofPutin's Palace, an opulent Black Sea mansion, not President Vladimir Putin, as the leader's critics had alleged.[57] Rotenberg explained that the property is intended to be developed as an apartment hotel, rather than a private residence.[58]
^abcАхмирова, Римма (Akhmirova, Rimma) (30 June 2009)."В тени путинского кимоно" [In the shadow of Putin's kimono].«Собеседник» (sobesednik.ru) (in Russian). Archived fromthe original on 5 July 2009. Retrieved25 September 2021.{{cite news}}: CS1 maint: multiple names: authors list (link)
^abКанев, Сергей (Kanev, Sergey) (7 October 2019).""Бандитский Ротенберг", или За кого не стыдно Владимиру Путину" ["Gangster Rothenberg", or for whom Vladimir Putin is not ashamed].МБХ медиа (in Russian). Archived fromthe original on 8 December 2019. Retrieved25 September 2021.The author Sergey Kanev is from Центр «Досье» (dossier.center).{{cite news}}: CS1 maint: multiple names: authors list (link)Archived on compromat.ru on 9 October 2019 as Как расцвел "Путус" Вовы-Однорукого и Лени-Спортсмена: История питерского "авторитета" Владимира Путырского и бывшего тренера Путина дзюдоиста-рецидивиста Леонида Усвяцова (How Vova-One-Armed and Leni-Sportsman's "Putus" blossomed: The story of the St. Petersburg "authority" Vladimir Putyrsky and the former coach of Putin, the judoka-recidivist Leonid Usvyatsov).
^Левитин, Игорь Евгеньевич [Levitin, Igor Yevgenyevich].kremlin.ru (in Russian).Archived from the original on 28 October 2018. Retrieved27 October 2018.
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