On October 23, the European Union adopted a 19th package of sanctions against Russia. This included sanctions on five Russian banks: Istina, Zemsky Bank, Absolut Bank, MTS Bank and Alfa-Bank.
The owners of these banks are listed below:
Istina is a non-bank financial institution founded in 2023. Its founder is RK Finance JSC, a subsidiary of the Russian space corporation Roscosmos.
Zemski Bank is an LLC founded by Svetlana Malakhova and Vladimir Simonov. Malakhov is the sister of of Andrey Kislov. Andrey Kislov is a Russian politician serving as a senator from Samara Oblast since 28 September 2021. Kislov is on the sanctions lists of the European Union, the United States, Canada and Switzerland., who is on the sanction lists of the EU, US, Canada, and Switzerland.
Absolut Bank. The last time information about the owners of the bank was disclosed to them several years ago. At that time, JSC Transfingroup Management Company and JSC Trinfico Management Company were trust managers of the pension reserves of NPF Blagosostoyanie, and CJSC Leader was also involved. In addition, French citizens Francis Louvard and Gregory Ingram appeared among the beneficiaries.
MTS Bank is owned by MTS PJSC, whose major shareholder (42%) is AFK Sistema PJSC. The main owner of AFK Sistema was businessman Vladimir Yevtushenkov (59.2030% of shares). In 2022, he was added to the UK sanctions list, after which he transferred 10% of the shares to his son, Felix.
Alfa-Bank is Russia’s largest private bank. On March 16, 2022, Andrey Kosogov acquired 40.1% of its shares.
