Privatization for hire: Russia’s state property chief is on the payroll of Putin pal Arkady Rotenberg

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Rosimushchestvo is a key institution in the management of assets owned by the Russian state. It collects dividends from companies in which the government holds shares, a list that includes firms in the fields of oil and gas extraction, transportation, telecoms, and mining — Transneft, Sovcomflot, Rostelecom, Zarubezhneft, Alrosa, Sheremetyevo Airport, Rosneft, and Gazprom, among multiple others.

The agency’s role expanded after the start of the full-scale invasion of Ukraine, when the assets of foreign companies leaving the Russian market began being transferred to Rosimushchestvo. It also took over assets seized from their former owners by the Prosecutor General’s Office. Still, calling this process a nationalization is misleading: Rosimushchestvo acts mainly as an intermediary, and the most profitable pieces of confiscated companies quickly end up with oligarchs close to the Kremlin, including the Rotenberg and Kovalchuk families.

Alcohol for Rotenberg

Although the word “privatization” is most commonly associated with Russia’s 1990s-era economic reforms, the term never really disappeared. In 2024, under a new wave of large-scale privatization, Russia’s largest state-owned alcohol producer, Rosspirtprom, was transferred into private hands. “What can be sold must be sold,” Rosimushchestvo head Vadim Yakovenko once quipped, explaining his philosophy of managing state property.

Rosspirtprom is a profitable enterprise with distilleries across multiple regions. Yet it was put up for auction and sold for just over 8 billion rubles ($104.5 million). The auction showed signs of being rigged, with market participants and alcohol-industry experts describing the price as unrealistically low.

The buyer was a little-known entity, Business Alliance LLC (ООО «Бизнес-альянс»), 51 percent owned by Opal LLC (ООО «Опал»), which in turn belongs to a closed-end mutual fund called Batman, managed by Fin-Partner (УК «Фин-партнер»).

“The fund’s beneficiaries are unknown,” business-focused Russian outlet Vedomosti reported. Nevertheless, The Insider, after obtaining internal financial documents from the Batman fund, was able to identify the investor — and thus the beneficiary of the privatization. It was none other than the oligarch Arkady Rotenberg, one of Vladimir Putin's judo sparring partners and childhood friends.

Putin’s longtime friend has shown interest in the alcohol sector before, including exerting informal influence on Rosspirtprom when it was still — officially — fully state-owned. Now, thanks to the corruption scheme involving Rosimushchestvo, Rotenberg has become the enterprise’s de facto owner.

Illicit enrichment

Before joining Rosimushchestvo in 2018, Yakovenko enjoyed stints with the Prosecutor’s Office, the Investigative Committee, the Federal Migration Service, and the Presidential Administration. In 2013, while serving as head of the Moscow Investigative Directorate, he divorced his wife, Olga Yakovenko. The break-up, however, was staged. The couple continued to live together and, according to leaked border-agency records, also accompanied one another on trips abroad.

Olga Yakovenko is officially employed by a Rotenberg-linked company. Since 2011, she has served as deputy chief accountant at TPS Nedvizhimost, a major real estate developer. Arkady Rotenberg transferred the company to his son Igor after he was added to international sanctions lists. Then, when Igor himself was sanctioned, the company was transferred to Rotenberg’s daughter, Liliya.

The Insider found that Yakovenko and his wife own property worth 1.2 billion rubles ($15.7 million), including:

• two houses in the Zhukovka dacha settlement,
• a 164.3-square-meter apartment in Moscow’s NV/9 residential complex,
• a 208-square-meter apartment in the Sadovye Kvartaly complex.

Rosimushchestvo’s chief could not have afforded purchases like these on his official salary.

Private jets and girlfriends

The European Union sanctioned Vadim Yakovenko only in 2024. The travel ban likely stung, as he had frequently vacationed in Germany, Switzerland, and Austria.

Olga Yakovenko, however, has no problem traveling to the West. The Insider found that in 2024 she obtained Serbian citizenship, which grants her visa-free entry to EU countries. Serbia has been handing out passports to members of Russia’s elite with notable generosity — Yakovenko’s daughters also acquired second citizenships courtesy of Belgrade.

Yakovenko is often accompanied by his wife and children on overseas trips. But there is another woman who frequently travels with him — though always separately from the main family: Viktoria Tsyplenkova, who is 10 years younger than Olga.

Tsyplenkova served as the spokesperson for Moscow’s Investigative Directorate during the period when Yakovenko headed the office. Their relationship, however, appears to extend beyond professional ties: the two made numerous joint trips abroad over the past decade, including to Munich, Zurich, Vienna, Thessaloniki, Istanbul, and Abu Dhabi.

Tsyplenkova now runs a small business. Her consulting company, Vesta LLC, which shows little income, is registered at the address of her 110-square-meter apartment in Moscow’s Petrovsky Park complex. In 2023, she also acquired two units totaling 126 square meters in the Slava residential complex. Her property holdings are worth about 150 million rubles ($1.9 million).

In recent years, Tsyplenkova has worked in the State Duma apparatus and at Sheremetyevo Airport, which is 30 percent controlled by Rosimushchestvo. Rotenberg is also a shareholder and at one point planned to buy out the airport entirely before abandoning the idea due to declining passenger traffic.

Despite his modest official earnings, Yakovenko frequently flies by private jet. In 2021, he flew to Munich with Tsyplenkova aboard a Bombardier Challenger registered as OE-ITH.

The war and sanctions have not put an end to Yakovenko’s foreign escapades. In 2023, he traveled to Turkey on a Hawker jet, tail number RA-02730.

That same aircraft has been used several times by Igor Rotenberg, Arkady Rotenberg's eldest son.

Yakovenko has also used a Gulfstream, M-ATPS, for flights to the Czech Republic and Germany. The aircraft is linked to Alexander Skorobogatko — Arkady Rotenberg's longtime business partner.