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Eastern Europe
January 19, 2018 www.intellinews.com I Page 15
Fridman hires BoA Merrill Lynch Russian head to run UK assets
Jason Corcoran in London
Russian oligarch Mikhail Fridman has hired Alexander Pertsovsky, the head of Bank of America Merrill Lynch’s Russian operation, to run his UK assets, which are in excess of $16bn, bne IntelliNews can reveal.
Pertsovsky, who announced he was stepping down in October from the helm of the Wall Street bank in Moscow, joined Fridman’s LetterOne operation based in London earlier this month, according to a UK regulatory filing obtained by bne IntelliNews.
Pertsovsky, who has been appointed the managing partner of L1 Technology, had been Russia coun- try head for five years at Bank of America Merrill Lynch. The Russian banker, a Columbia Business School graduate, is very experienced and had previously headed the Renaissance Capital invest- ment bank and its parent Renaissance Group for
a decade.
Pertsovsky, who didn’t reply to emails seeking comment, is believed to have been frustrated by Bank of America’s lack of ambition in Russia. The Russian banker had understood that the US lender would acquire a domestic banking license in 2014 or 2015 so it could access ruble-denomi- nated fixed-income markets. However, US sanc- tions imposed against Russia greatly restricted the activity of all Wall Street players in Russia by curbing their risk appetite.
Fridman, one of original oligarchs under Boris Yeltsin, moved his operations to London two years ago even after President Vladimir Putin called on
The warchest of Mikhail Fridman's London-based LetterOne is mainly derived from the proceeds of the 2013 sale of the Alfa Group’s Russian oil company TNK-BP.
Russia’s high-net worth individuals to repatriate their wealth.
Fridman, who became tax resident in the UK in 2016, retains an office in London’s old money May- fair district. His LetterOne’s war chest for acquisi- tions is mainly derived from the proceeds of the 2013 sale of the Alfa Group’s Russian oil company TNK-BP.
The key to Fridman keeping on side of the Kremlin has been his suave partner Petr Aven, who joined Alfa in 1991 after serving as Russia’s foreign minister.
Aven regularly meets with Vladimir Putin at the Russian president’s Novo-Ogarevo residence and was even conferred with a state award for corpo- rate citizenship personally by Putin in May 2016. The late Boris Berezovsky, who was once known as the Godfather of the Kremlin, once admitted that it was Aven who introduced him to Putin.
A former Alfa executive told bne IntelliNews that Fridman and his partners were allowed to keep the $14bn proceeds of their sale of TNK-BP offshore. “Abramovich was allowed to keep his proceeds from the sale of SibAl and Sibneft, and Fridman/Alfa were allowed to too,” said the for- mer Alfa executive. “This is probably driven by their personal relations with Putin.”
Fridman, who was dubbed the Teflon Oligarch
by bne IntelliNews for his survival skills, is a regu- lar on the London party and arts scene, but still