Rentier Yuri Milner
Billionaire Yuri Milnerwho last year renounced his Russian citizenship, turned out to be the buyer of a penthouse in the London residential complex One Blackfriars, the apartments of which are “considered one of the most expensive real estate properties” in the British capital, writes Bloomberg. The agency refers to documents from the company MFRD Property Holdings.
In those documents, MFRD Property Holdings listed Milner as having “significant” control over the Cayman Islands-registered entity that purchased the apartment. The deal was concluded back in 2021. Its amount was £57.6 million ($70.3 million). Milner’s representative confirmed the information published by Bloomberg to Forbes.
MFRD Representative reported Bloomberg that the money for the purchase of the home came through a trust and that the property was purchased for investment purposes. The beneficiary of the trust is a charitable foundation, the purchased apartment is rented out, and the income goes to the account of a non-profit organization, the representative specified.
Milner, who also owns a $100 million home in Los Altos, California, pays market rent for a London penthouse when he stays in London, he said. Currently, one of the penthouses in the 50-story One Blackfriars skyscraper on the banks of the Thames is rented for £14,950 ($18,172) per month, Bloomberg points out.
The purchase was made through La Paloma Property, a company registered in Delaware, where by law the heads of companies are not required to disclose their identities. Sources say the mansion was paid for in cash and shares, with one source claiming shares in the social networking site Facebook were among them. This method of paying for real estate is unusual in California. […]
The seller of the building was the famous businessman Fred Chan, founder of ESS Technology. […] The purchased home, which is the largest mansion in the area, includes five bedrooms, nine bathrooms, a tennis court and two adjoining lots. On the ground floor of the building there are two bedrooms, a game room, a maid’s room, a security room, a gym, a sauna and spa, an indoor pool, a three-car garage and a car wash, Mercury News writes. The second floor houses the remaining bedrooms, two dining rooms and a living room.
Milner is the founder of the DST Global fund, which invested in AirbnbSpotify, Meta (owned by Facebook, Whatsapp And Instagram, recognized as an extremist organization in Russia and banned) and other technology companies in the early stages. American Forbes estimates the businessman’s fortune is $6.8 billion. Last year Milner took 15th place in Russian Forbes rating, then his capital was estimated at $7.3 billion. Last October, Milner announced that he and his family had renounced Russian citizenship. According to him, they left Russia back in 2014, and in the summer of 2022 they officially completed the process of renouncing citizenship. Since 1999, Milner has been an Israeli citizen.
In the spring of 2022, Milner announced that he would donate $100 million to refugees from Ukraine. Founded by the businessman together with his wife Julia, the Breakthrough Prize Foundation established the Tech for Refugees initiative, which also brought together large IT companies with investments from DST Global, including Airbnb, Flexport and Spotify.
Yuri Milner has never been under sanctions. Among all Russian billionaires, he has perhaps the most impeccable reputation in the West and the informal status of “one of the world’s most influential technology investors.” The Milner Family Foundation Breakthrough Prize is donating $100 million to refugees from Ukraine and has partnered with Airbnb, Flexport and Spotify to establish the Tech For Refugees initiative to promote humanitarian assistance to refugees around the world. […] Since 1999, Milner has had an Israeli passport, lives in the United States on a special visa, and in the last couple of years has preferred to refer to himself as an “Israeli investor.”
The Parade Papers came out when the scandal surrounding “Russian interference in the American elections” and the influence of social networks on the election of bad Trump had already broken out. Milner had to write an open letter in which he stated: “The idea that we are working in the interests of the Russian government is nothing more than a fairy tale.” But since then, Milner has completely distanced himself from Russia and has now announced the cessation of his citizenship. This should help him stop making excuses when communicating with the media and partners who considered him a Russian-Israeli businessman.