Real History and how Jewish Oligarchs from Russia fled to Israel Index to the Traditional Enemies of Free Speech Alphabetical index (text) your dossier on the oligarchsyour index on origins of anti-Semitism [images added by this website] Russian Jewish Oligarchs Under Siege The rise and fall of Russia’s Jewish tycoons By Yehezkel Laing HE lives in a $3.7 million home in Herzliya Pituah and his net worth was recently estimated
at .1 billion. He was just crowned “the richest person in Israel” by the Israeli press. No, it’s not Steff Wertheimer , not Lev Leviev and not even Sammy Ofer . Try Leonid Nevzlin . If the name is unfamiliar, you’re not alone. Only a little over a year in Israel, Nevzlin recently became the major shareholder in Russia’s biggest oil company, Yukos, after its principal shareholder Mikhail Khodorkovsky , who is in trouble with the Russian authorities, gave him his 60 percent share.
To understand the size of Yukos, consider that in 2002 alone it posted annual revenues of $11 billion and a net profit of $3b. But the title of richest Israeli may be premature, as Nevzlin’s wealth is only on paper. The assets of the company he controls have been seized by the government, which is seeking more than $27 billion in back taxes. Some say that Yukos’s strength was the source of its weakness.
By becoming so wealthy and so powerful, the Yukos group posed a threat to the powers that be. Nevzlin claims that Putin is taking revenge on him and Khodorkovsky for supporting Putin’s opponents in the last elections. To escape an arrest warrant, Nevzlin fled to Israel in October 2003. He came with two other Jewish heads of Yukos, Vladimir Duvdov and Michail Brodno , who together own 22% of the company, or $7 billion worth. Yukos head Khodorkovsky, also Jewish, wasn’t as lucky.
Once considered Russia’s richest man, worth an estimated $15 billion, he has sat for the past year in a Russian jail. According to the Russian press, Nevzlin took control of Khodorkovsky’s stake in Bank Menatep under a shareholder agreement foreseeing a transfer of ownership if Yukos were stripped of substantial assets. To recover punitive tax claims against Yukos, the Russian government recently sold Yukos’s daughter company Yugensk at what many believe was a rigged auction.
Yugensk pumps one million barrels a day, accounting for 60% of Yukos’s total output. The winner of the auction was Baikal Finans, an unknown outfit registered in a provincial Russian town. It paid $9.4b. for the company. Only a few weeks later the state oil firm, OAO Rosneft, took over Baikal Finans and installed its own management team, so Yugensk is now back in the hands of the Russian state.
Some have expressed fears that the re-nationalization of Yukos represents a reversal of the privatization of Russian industry and could lead to lower GDP growth. Economists say that if the fall of Yukos was an anomaly, then the Russian economy need not be overly concerned, but if it is part of a grander political plan, then trouble lies ahead. THE FAIRYTALE story of how Nevzlin and other Jews became Russian oligarchs starts almost 20 years ago.
In 1987, Nevzlin and Brodno were simple computer programmers working for the government. One day Nevzlin saw a small ad — a marketing company was offering its services to computer firms. He called and Khodorkovsky answered. The two men eventually became friends, and together established Bank Menatep. Shortly thereafter, Prime Minister Boris Yeltsin began the privatization scheme which was to become the source of wealth for many Jewish tycoons.
His government began distributing vouchers in public companies to Russian citizens. But to the disappointment of the public, the vouchers turned out to be practically worthless. Many citizens didn’t even save them. Khodorkovsky and Nevzlin didn’t mind that the vouchers were considered worthless; they realized their true value, and via Menatep began buying them up, often at laughable prices.
Almost 10 years later, in 1996, Yeltsin encountered big political problems and couldn’t manage more than 10% in the polls. Desperate for money, he turned to Menatep. The bank reportedly gave him $200m. for his election campaign — $197 more than the law allowed. After his