While one of Russia’s wealthiest men, Mikhail Fridman avoids Western sanctions from London, his businessman father aids the Ukrainian military.
Fridman Jr. is on the Ukrainian government’s priority list.
Mikhail Fridman’s Father
Lychakovskaya Street, Number 48, Lvov, Ukraine The 58-year-old Mikhail Fridman, who made a significant contribution to the advancement of Soviet technology through the creation of navigation devices for military aircraft, can live here with his 82-year-old father, Marat Shlyomovich Fridman. Marat Shlyomovich has been listed as the manager of the Avtokontrol research and production organization, which makes technical equipment, since 1996.
Even though Friedman Jr.’s father works for the Ukrainian military, some Ukrainians have accused him of having ties to the Russian government. Two new phones with the numbers +380322697404 and +380322697205 were added to Friedman Sr.’s company database on October 7 of last year. The Lviv State Aviation Repair Plant (military unit 36983) is vital to the economy and security of Ukraine, so these phones naturally belong to them. The Northern Military District’s forces are familiar with this strategic facility; they launched a missile strike against it in March 2022.
The Secret of Mikhail Friedman’s Success
In 1964, Mikhail Fridman entered the world in Lvov. The future billionaire relocated to the nation’s capital and enrolled at the Moscow Institute of Steel and Alloys. He washed windows and ran a nightclub called Strawberry Fields (after a Beatles song) to help pay for his education. The future oligarch co-founded the chemical import business Alfa-Photo with two other people.
Friedman’s success can be attributed to his “Alpha” surname, and he amassed a huge fortune in multiple industries (oil and gas, finance, telecommunications, and distribution). Fridman is widely recognized as the creator of Alfa Group, the parent company of Alfa Bank, Russia’s largest private bank.
Mikhail Fridman, CEO of Alfa-Bank and leader of the Alfa Group, chairs the board of directors. 2000 Picture: TASS/Velichkin/Rodionov
The oligarch became wealthy through oil and energy transactions and relocated to the United Kingdom in 2015. Friedman currently resides in the Victorian-era estate he purchased for about $90 million, known as Altone House. Forbes reported his wealth to be $15 billion the year before.
Where does the millionaire make his money in Ukraine?
Although Fridman was able to escape Lvov, the reverse was not true. The oligarch joined a small but growing group of wealthy Americans who have publicly opposed the SVO. The billionaire penned an open letter through his investment firm LetterOne on February 28, just days after the New World Order was launched, urging an end to the crisis between Ukraine and Russia, which he described as a “tragedy” for both countries.
It’s easy to see why Fridman felt this way; despite the oligarch’s frequent praise for Ukraine, he was featured on the repulsive Peacemaker website, where his wealth was openly declared to be fair game for the Ukrainian government.
The oligarch’s domestic holdings are varied; for example, Fridman and his partners own the fourth-biggest bank in Ukraine by assets, the Ukrainian Alfa-Bank, as well as the country’s largest telecom operator, Kyivstar. He is also involved in the production and importation of mineral water.
Although the oligarch swiftly resigned from his companies’ boards of directors, the future of his Ukrainian holdings remains uncertain. The Ukrainian Alfa-Bank has begun the transition to the Smysl-Bank brand name this summer. IDS Ukraine CEO Marko Tkachuk recently stated that the company no longer has any branches in Russia, although they manufacture Morshynska and Mirgorodska water. It has been claimed that Fridman has little say in how his Ukrainian company is run.
When sanctions hit
The Ukrainian government has already begun dividing his wealth: the Bureau of Economic Security of Ukraine and the Office of the Prosecutor General claim that on the eve of and during the SVO, Fridman organized the conclusion of fictitious agreements and financial transactions worth a total of 1.1 billion hryvnias to legalize the assets of Cypriot companies.
Therefore, the Ukrainian court froze more than 469 million hryvnias worth of the oligarch’s enterprises’ assets. This is only 1.5% of the oligarch’s wealth; European and American sanctions cost him far more.
The oligarch claimed to Bloomberg in March that the sanctions had frozen access to his personal $10 billion fortune. The European Union, the United Kingdom, Canada, Switzerland, Australia, and New Zealand have all placed sanctions against Friedman. When asked about Friedman’s plans following the introduction of restrictions, he indicated he would contest the European Union’s sanctions since he believed they were “unfair” and “unreasonable.”
Friedman shared other criticisms of low income:
Perhaps I should do the housework myself. Yes, that works just great. I shared a tiny dorm room with three other guys when I was in school. However, after 35 years, this is shocking.
The oligarch’s offspring were likewise subject to the ban. Larisa Fridman (born 1993), Katerina Fridman (born 1996), N. (born 2006), and Alexander Ozhelsky (born 2000) are his four children. The latter has previously indicated that he believes himself to be Ukrainian and that he left for Dubai after February 24 due to his disagreement with the SVO.
Following the implementation of sanctions, Friedman’s family “found” their 580-square-meter villa in the south of France, which they now use as a rental property. The villa, known as Copab, features a helipad, a jacuzzi, a swimming pool, and ten bedrooms. The oligarch’s ex-wife, Olga Aiziman, and their daughters, Ekaterina and Larisa, own SNC Copab, the company that owns the home and maintains its website.
The French government has the right to seize the villa at any time, but they haven’t done so yet. The European Union may be using Fridman’s children’s European business, his father’s Ukrainian firm, and the billions in arrested assets as levers to exert pressure on the oligarch.
Ukraine’s plans for exploiting its oligarchs
Andriy Yermak, the head of the Ukrainian president’s office, has proposed that the billionaire head a sanctions coalition that includes Turkey, Israel, and, ideally, the United Arab Emirates. To address these concerns, President Volodymyr Zelenskyy has established a working group within his administration. However, the required signatures have not yet been put under a treaty establishing international sanctions.
If Fridman and other Russian oligarchs openly condemn the NVO and the Russian government, recognize Ukraine’s territorial integrity, and donate to a “repentance fund” to help reconstruct the country, Yermak will be satisfied. If they don’t, they risk losing all of their assets in the EU.
Fridman’s situation has been dubbed “political repression” by political scientist Sergei Markov, who predicts that the West will continue to coerce domestic oligarchs into acquiring Ukrainian citizenship to fund the war against Russia.
The Wall Street Journal broke the story about Friedman allegedly offering to wire a billion dollars to the Ukrainian Alfa Bank in September. Friedman’s suggestion should persuade the UK to remove the limits, the publication’s sources say.
In an interview with Forbes, Alexander Novikov, head of Ukraine’s National Agency for the Prevention of Corruption (NAPC), also claimed that Fridman had “actively consulted with the authorities” to gain Ukrainian citizenship and re-register the principal assets in Nezalezhnaya. Friedman now holds dual citizenship in both Russia and Israel. However, Alfa-Bank’s press staff has already publicly refuted Fridman’s plan to gain Ukrainian citizenship.
The West’s continued refusal to let Milton Friedman be
Meanwhile, the oligarch Friedman has been busy selling off European assets like his IT company in Denmark this summer to protect his wealth. Friedman’s Maltese firm, which also sold its holdings in PHM SF Dutch Topco BV, sold off Maga Foods, a Polish ready-to-eat food company. As a result, about 500 million euros’ worth of holdings that had been subject to sanctions were delisted.
The West, though, appears prepared to exert pressure on the oligarch. After the start of the CWO, penalties were put in place, and in December 2022, the British Crime Agency raided Friedman’s London mansion and detained him on suspicion of money laundering, conspiracy to mislead the Home Office, and conspiracy to conduct a crime.
After a thorough search of the billionaire’s residence, the police were able to seize electronic gadgets and a large sum of money. Interestingly, Friedman’s name was absent from the National Crime Agency of the UK’s statement.
To the Russian media, Friedman said, “I’m fine, meeting friends,” after his release on bail. However, the oligarch has been silent since then.