Oligarch Renounces Russian Citizenship
Oleg Tinkov lost billions of dollars between Nov. 2021 and March 2022. Photo: William Webster/Reuters.
Oleg Tinkov, the founder of Moscow-based Tinkoff Bank, renounced his Russian citizenship. The businessman made the announcement this week in an Instagram post, writing “I can’t and won’t be associated with a fascist country, that started a war with their peaceful neighbour and killing innnocent people daily.” Tinkov is one of just a few prominent Russian tycoons that have publicly criticized or taken action against Russian President Vladimir Putin’s regime over the war in Ukraine.
The New York Times reported Tinkov’s claims that after he posted criticism of the invasion in April, Putin’s administration threatened to nationalize Tinkoff Bank if it did not cut ties with the businessman. As a result, Tinkov was “forced” by the Kremlin to sell his 35 percent stake in the company with no leverage with which to negotiate a price. By the end of April he had hired security guards and went into hiding. Tinkov’s stakes were sold to a conglomerate controlled by Vladimir Potanin, one of the country’s richest men who has close ties to Putin.
In a follow-up Instagram post today, Tinkov posted that he is currently working with attorneys to try and remove his name and personal brand from the bank and what it now represents.
Tinkov has been one of the most outspoken critics of Putin and the invasion among his peers. However, many who agree with his sentiment may be hesitant to call him an ally. Tinkov is considered an oligarch, one of a group of businessmen that were able to amass huge sums of wealth since the privatization of formerly state-owned Soviet assets in the 1990s. Many of them, including Tinkov, were hit with heavy sanctions from the West at the beginning of the war. Some were indirect in effect like the decision to suspend Russian banks from the SWIFT payment infrastructure. Others were targeted, such as when British legislation banned Tinkov’s access to his ships and aircraft kept in the United Kingdom. Western leaders have believed since the beginning of the war that Russia’s oligarchs, because of their ties to Putin’s administration, are complicit in the regime’s conduct.
The Instagram Post announcing Tinkov’s citizenship renunciation. Photo: Oleg Tinkov Instagram post.
Last fall, Tinkov pled guilty to tax fraud in the United States and agreed to pay more than $500 million in fines. An attorney for the Justice Department stated that “in 2013, when the value of Oleg Tinkov’s investment in his bank’s stock rose to over a billion dollars, Tinkov quickly renounced his U.S. citizenship and then lied to the IRS in a ploy to evade ‘exit taxes’ he knew were due.” Even months before the invasion and subsequent sanctions, Tinkov had found himself in a position of animosity with the West.
As political tensions rose significantly this past winter following the invasion in February, Tinkov was hit hard financially. Forbes estimated that his fortune dropped from around $9 billion in November to around $800 million at the beginning of March.
The extent to which Tinkov’s financial losses had an effect on his relationship with the Russian government is unclear. But in interviews and social media posts, he asserts that he has been independent from the Kremlin, writing that he hopes “more prominent Russian businessmen will follow me, so it weakens Putin’s regime and his economy.” For now, Tinkov remains a citizen of Cyprus and is generally presumed to be staying somewhere in Europe.