Dmitry Rybolovlev

Introduction

Dmitry Yevgenyevich Rybolovlev is a Russian billionaire and associate of US President Donald Trump. As of April 2019, Rybolovlev is ranked 224th on Forbes's list of billionaires with a net worth of $6.8 billion. [1]

Dmitry Rybolovlev made most of his fortune from the sale of two potash fertilizer companies for a combined US$8-billion in 2010 and 2011. He held both companies OAO Uralkali and OAO Silvinit through Cyprus-based Madura Holding Ltd. [2] Rybolovlev owned the potash producer Uralkali, Russia's largest producer of potassium fertilizers. He sold part of his controlling stake in Uralkali in 2011, pocketing $6.5 billion overnight and affording him the time and money to splash out on high-profile properties around the world. [3]

Rybolovlev went into business with his scientist father Evgeny Rybolovlev in 1990 after studying medicine at Russia's Perm Medical Institute. [4] “He started a business focused on offering medical treatments using magnetic fields” called Magnetics company. [5] In March 1992, Rybolovlev founded the Inkombrok investment brokerage company and the Kamennyy Belt check investment fund. That same year he became president of the financial house investment company. [6] In 1994 he was Acting Chairman of the Board of Bank “Credit FD”, and later was appointed Chairman of the Board of Directors. In 1994 he joined the board of directors of Russia's largest potash producer Uralkali and in 1996 he became the Chairman of the board there. [7]

Murder Allegations

Rybolovlev was accused of ordering the 1995 murder of Evgeny Panteleymonov, the general director of Netfchimik, which produced industrial alcohol. Rybolovlev was chairman of Netfchimik and owned 40 percent of the company. [8] Panteleymonov had met with Rybolovlev and told him criminals within the company had to go. Rybolovlev had offered him bodyguards for his protection which he refused. Panteleymonov was gunned down by a mob-linked businessman named Oleg Lomakin (aka Prokop). Lomakin was arrested for Panteleymonov’s shooting, and, “in exchange for leniency”, he accused Rybolovlev of ordering the murder. No other evidence linked Rybolovlev to the shooting, and Prokop admitted that he had perjured himself. After nearly a year of incarceration, Rybolovlev was allowed to post bail of one billion rubles (about $200,000). In 1997, he was acquitted of murder charges. [9]

The Maison de L’Amitie - Donald Trump deal

In 2017 Rybolovlev came under media scrutiny after the 2005 tax returns of now-U.S. President Donald Trump revealed details of an abnormal real estate deal in Palm Beach, Florida. [10] Rybolovlev bought the Donald Trump Palm Beach mansion, Maison de L’Amitie for $95m in 2008 which was the centre of a divorce fight with wife Elena Rybolovlev. [11] According to author Michael Wolffe, author of Siege: Trump Under Fire "Trump earned a fee for hiding the real owner – a shadow owner possibly being funneled cash by Rybolovlev for other reasons beyond the value of the house. Rybolovlev might have paid himself for the house, thereby (money laundering) $55m." [12]

Dmitry Rybolovlev and Donald Trump claim never to have met. But on the eve of the presidential election the Rybolovlev private plane - M-Kate, an Airbus-319 - flew several times to the United States to cities where Donald Trump was holding meetings. Some of these flights have been documented. It has been established that on 30 October 2016 Rybolovlev's jet and Trump's jet landed almost at the same time in Las Vegas. [13] The same thing happened on 3 November in Charlotte, North Carolina, where Rybolovlev's jet landed for 22 hours, as reported by the local press. Moreover, Rybolovlev's jet made frequent trips to Moscow. [14] In March 2017, another yacht trip in the British Virgin Islands, showed Ryvolovlev's boat next to that of Rob Mercer, one of the major financial supporters of Trump's campaign.

In 2017, Dmitry Rybolovlev’s private Jet M-KATE and Yacht "Anna" were spotted in Dubrovnik, Croatia at the same time as Ivanka and Jared Kushner vacationed there, raising questions whether they secretly met for an off the record meeting.[15] According to the FBI, Steve Bannon knew Kushner was on vacation “with Wendy Deng Murdoch, a Russian billionaire, and the Russian's girlfriend [Daria Strokous]”. At the time Russian model Daria Strokous was dating Dmitry Rybolovlev. Steve Bannon “said his friends in the intelligence community said the girlfriend was "questionable." [16] Previously Wendy Deng Murdoch was also spotted vacationing on Roman Abramovich’s yacht, a close friend of Rybolovlev, where it was rumored she met Vladamir Putin. Wendy Deng Murdoch is the ex wife of Rupurt Murdoch, a media mogul listed in Epstein’s little black book and was flagged by US intelligence as a potential Chinese spy. British intelligence officials reportedly discussed with the FBI whether Ms Murdoch’s friendship with Tony Blair, the former PM, was a cause of concern. [17]

Dmitry Rybolovlev remains close to the Kremlin, as evidenced by his friendship with Yuri Troutnev, one of the right arms of Vladimir Putin. [18] Donald Trump Jr., invited in September 2008 to a real estate conference in New York, had explained that "the Russians" now constituted "a rather disproportionate part" of the assets of the Trump family empire. [19]

The My Anna yacht and parties with young girls

In 2008, Dmitry during divorce proceedings it was revealed he took a vacation on his yacht off Croatia with “young girls whose passports said they were born in 1988 and 1989 but they looked much younger in photographs that were taken on this occasion,” according to court papers. They partied on his yacht “My Anna,” named after his daughter. [20] According to court proceedings Dmitry Rybolovlev admitted to sleeping with his butler, his assistant, and students which he happily shared with other oligarchs. He said “he appreciated only teenage girls, younger than his own daughter”. Notable guests on the My Anna yacht includes British-based Israeli-Russian billionaire Roman Abramovich. [21] According to the author of The Bouvier Affair, her biggest shock was learning about the underground world of “sex parties”. The “commodification of women’s bodies on such a large scale was very eye-opening.” [22] The Rybolovlev divorce was finalized in 2014, with a record $4.8 billion awarded to Elena. That amount subsequently was slashed to $604 million by a judge in 2015, then later settled privately. [23]

Holdings

Elena Rybolovlev accused Dmitry Rybolovlev of using a “multitude of third- parties” to create a network of offshore holding companies and trusts to place assets — including about US$500-million in art, US$36-million in jewelry and an US$80-million yacht — beyond her reach. [24] In her divorce filing, Elena Rybolovlev outlined some of holdings, including an artwork and furniture collection valued between $480 million and $800 million; The Rybolovlev family had offshore holdings in Cyprus, the British Virgin Islands, Panama and the Jersey Islands.

• $138 million property in Gstaad
• $24 million property in Paris
• $50 million of real-estate holdings in Moscow
• $95 million Palm Beach estate
• $95 million jet
• Tax-shelter property in Cyprus
• Bank accounts in Geneva, Singapore and London.
[25]

In 2011 Rybolovlev paid more than $300 million for the La Belle Epoque penthouse in Monaco, where he lives. And that same year, the billionaire picked up a seven-acre Hawaiian villa in Kauai from movie star Will Smith for $20 million. [26] Will Smith and Jada Pinkett-Smith made a $6.5 million profit selling their property on Secret Beach in the Hanalei district, Hawaii off-market to a trust connected to Dmitry Rybolovlev's daughter Ekaterina. [27]

Cyprus was the center of Rybolovlev’s business activities. One of his closest partners in the Mediterranean island nation was the former Cypriot lawmaker Andreas Neocleous, whose law firm had specialized in the establishment of offshore companies. [28] Dmitry Rybolovlev is the largest shareholder in the Bank of Cyprus, with a 9.9% stake in the company. [29] Rybolovlev acquired Cypriot citizenship in 2012, spokesman: “natural [for him] to get citizenship upon becoming an investor in Bank of Cyprus” Prior to 2013, Cypriot citizenship was granted on a discretionary basis by ministers, in a less formal version of the current “golden visas” scheme. [30] In 2014, Rybolovlev ex-wife Elena Rybolovlev was detained for 24 hours by Cypriot police after she flew into Cyprus from Switzerland, detained under a lawsuit filed by Domus Trust lawyers in connection with “the theft of the trust’s property.” [31]

Dmitry Rybolovlev bought Aristotle Onassis’s legendary island of Skorpios for a reported $100 million from the Greek tycoon’s daughter Athina Roussel along with the smaller island of Tsokari. [32] Dmitry Rybolovlev plans to turn Skorpios island into the first luxury accommodation complex in Greece to entertain the world’s richest elite. [33] Dmitry Rybolovlev spent $88m for a Manhattan apartment for his daughter Ekaterina bought from former Citi chairman Sandy Weill. The penthouse is located at 15 Central Park West. The money from the sale was “donated to charity”. [34] According to a suit filed during divorce proceedings it is alleged Rybolovlev’s daughter's $88 million penthouse purchase was done with “the specific intent of hiding and diverting his personal interest in the property." [35]

FC Monaco

In 2011 Rybolovlev became president and majority shareholder (66%) of Monaco's football club AS Monaco. (Prince Albert II of Monaco owns the rest.) [36] In 2016, the KPMG audit company ranked the richest football clubs in the world, which included three football clubs owned by Russian businessmen. Among them - FC Monaco Dmitry Rybolovlev (26th place; $ 206 million). [37] Rybolovlev used AS Monaco, to “build up a tight network with close contacts to ministers, members of parliament and police officials who helped him with his business interests, provided him with confidential information and formulated draft laws reflecting his needs.” Rybolovlev instructed Vadim Vasilyev, deputy at AS Monaco to create a list of important people the club should send a “gift basket” to during the holiday season. Vasilyev created a list of 52 names that were divided into the "categories A, B and C" and including Prince Albert II. [38]

Monaco-gate

In 2017 in a scandal called Monaco-gate, Philippe Narmino, the minister of justice for Monaco, resigned after texts revealed he worked on behalf of Rybolovlev to influence a billion-dollar art fraud case. “a vast influence-peddling scandal at the heart of Monaco institutions” [39] In 2018, Rybolovlev was charged and released. Authorities announced "He was neither released on bail nor any travel restriction order has been issued in his respect [..] he is not restricted from leaving Monaco and not limited to his movements." [40] Russia’s embassy in France took a special interest in Dmitry Rybolovlev’s detention in Monaco and asked for a clarification. Russia's Ambassador to France Aleksandr Orlov also serves as envoy to Monaco. [41]

Rybolovlev sued Sotheby’s, claiming Bouvier and Sotheby’s Vice Chairman for worldwide private sales, Samuel Valette induced him “to pay inflated, fraudulent prices” and then used Sotheby’s as a “veneer of legitimacy and expertise” by providing “inflated appraisals on demand.” [42] In 2020, Monaco court dismissed the criminal case against Yves Bouvier but Rybolovlev is still being investigated over corruption charges filed by Bouvier Monaco, Switzerland and France. [43] "If all this were true, I think [Rybolovlev] will withdraw on his own", declared Prince Albert II of Monaco in 2018. [44] One of the paintings Rybolovlev bought through Bouvier for 127.5 million, Leonardo da Vinci's Salvator Mundi became the most expensive in the world after it was sold to Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman for $450.3 million for the Louvre Abu Dhabi. [45] In 2018, it was reported that few had any idea where it was and some worried it was “somehow lost''. [46] There has been speculation that the origin of Rybolovlev's attack against Bouvier, is a project to create a free port like those used by Bouvier in Geneva, Singapore and Luxembourg. [47] Bouvier has confirmed that his free port projects have been negatively impacted by the conflict with Rybolovlev. [48]