Alexey Mordashov General Director of Severstal Group, Chairman of the Board of Directors of Power Machines, Arcelor's largest shareholder, member of the Bureau of Law. Steel King Mordashov where he lives
I am the ex-wife of an oligarch. Doesn't it sound proud? Unless, of course, you do not focus on the word "former". But it just so happened that this word plays a key role in my life today. In my city, it has become a label for me, if you like - a wolf ticket, a seal of rejection ...
Never been a feminist. And now I want to create a public organization, or rather, even a party of "past" wives and real mothers like me. After everything I have experienced, I have enough mental strength and will to not only protect myself and my child from the arbitrariness of my ex-husband, but also defend our interests before the state.
The interests of those women with whom their husbands part at that very long-awaited moment when success comes, when prosperity comes, when a career is at its peak ...
Women with whom husbands share everything "fairly" during a divorce: for the wife - children, for the husband - everything that is acquired "by overwork, by him alone" ...
I know I'll be judged by the so-called "business women". They will begin to shower reproaches: you have to be strong, you had to achieve success yourself ...
It is foolish to demand absolute ear for music from the entire population, it is also absurd to hope that all women can be "businesslike".
I am only to blame for allowing myself to be just a woman, preferring a family to all the rest of the variety of life ...
My 15-year-old son and I live in the city of Cherepovets, Vologda Oblast. We try not to watch local television. Too often they show the very, very man of our region. The richest, the most famous. Recommending himself to the general public as a rare human soul. I would have believed that this handsome man, the general director of OAO Severstal, Alexei Mordashov, is the embodiment of nobility, if ... I didn’t know him so well.
I lived with him in a legal marriage for 10 years, and now I am raising the eldest son of Mr. Mordashov alone.
We've been divorced for five years now. No, I do not regret anything, on the contrary, I campaign for a divorce if an equal marriage turns into humiliation. But for a civilized divorce. In our country, divorce is a social problem that falls entirely on the shoulders of ex-wives. And this problem is especially evident when it comes to the wives and children of the "old" marriage of rich men.
I have a friend who selflessly nursed her husband after being wounded in Afghanistan. She put him on his feet in the literal sense of the word. In "gratitude" he kicked her out of the house pregnant. Her girl is already 12 years old, her father became a rich businessman, but her mother does not receive alimony for her daughter.
Ask - why? And what can you take from a man if he can destroy this woman with one short instruction, if she decides to go to court ...
Another woman is regularly beaten by a very wealthy and eminent husband so that she does not reproach him for having young mistresses. Two kids, nowhere to go. He told her: "Where will you go? You have nowhere to live, and I will prove to the court that you cannot feed and raise children, I will take them away from you and let them go naked around the world." And she is afraid for herself, for her children. Walks in bruises and remembers the times when they were poor, loved each other, and happiness was real.
I know the director of one large factory, from which his wife and child left. She was lucky - she married a second time. The ex-husband runs his factory so enthusiastically, he forgot that he has a son. Guess if the boy's mom gets child support? That's right - no. To sue with such a magnitude is to ruin the life of a new husband ...
Many years ago I married a student Alyosha Mordashov. A son was born, life was very difficult for us. The child was seriously ill, everything fell on my shoulders - home, family, worries about my husband. During the day I nursed my son, and in the evenings I worked as a cleaner. Behind him was the institute, a diploma with honors. Life has set a choice - either a family, or graduate school and a career. Of course, the son's health and the husband's peace of mind were more important. Working as a cleaner, I earned us an apartment.
As time went. We finally got our own housing, my son's health improved, I got a job as an accountant in a bank, my husband worked at the Cherepovets Metallurgical Plant. He quickly moved up the corporate ladder. When my husband rose to the rank of financial director of the Severstal plant, his business trips to Moscow began. Secular receptions and presentations followed.
One day he returned and said that he felt uncomfortable at the next party - everyone around was getting wads of money out of their pockets. At that time, we still "did not catch up" to the metropolitan scale.
He left for the next presentation, taking both of our salaries. We created an image for him.
It was I who got up at 4-5 in the morning, cooked breakfast for him, woke him up and always accompanied him to the door. It was I who always, at any hour, was waiting for him to come home.
It was me, standing at the window at night, afraid that the worst thing would happen to him, after the threats of the bandits with whom he did not share something, I prayed to God that Alexei would be alive. And one day I said:
"Let him be better with his mistress, if only he is alive!"
God heard me...
Mistresses appeared as soon as he became a financial director, almost along with a company car ...
I forgave the first, second. Every night I waited until the morning and went to work with a ringing head. The whole day I was boiling in the cauldron of my own experiences. I felt like I had been squeezed like an orange and then just thrown away...
He left. Then he divided the property, as befits a rich husband, to me - a miserable apartment, an old "nine". Himself - all that he owns. At that time, he was the general director of the giant metallurgical plant Severstal, he owned the lion's share of the authorized capital in other firms he had founded, and much more, about which I had a very rough idea.
There was no question of fairness. He said: “You can’t think. Try to encroach on at least something of mine - I will deprive you of everything left, I will take your son away from you. You don’t want Ilya to suffer without you?” I had no doubt then that one day I could "wake up" next to my own head...
The head of the city-forming enterprise could do anything. Create a bad reputation for me, push me into a "psychiatric hospital", "convince" the court that I am right.
I agreed to sign a document, according to which everything, apart from the "nine" and a few square meters, went to my husband. I thought that I paid in full for my future quiet life with my son.
How wrong I was!
The day I became an "ex" turned my life into a nightmare. And finally, Mordashov said: "Remember, you should be grateful for everything you have. You have no right to privacy."
First, I was kicked out of the bank (the bank was subordinate to Mr. Mordashov). Then all the doors in the city slammed shut in front of me, where I knocked in search of work. To help me out meant to come into conflict with Mordashov. One lady said: "Lena, I treat you very well, but I don't want to quarrel with Alexei. And I advise you - make peace!" The paradox was that I did not quarrel with him, but was just an ex-wife ...
He, of course, quickly married. His parents, to whom my son and I went on weekends, said: “You don’t come to us on Saturdays, we will have Alyosha and Lena, and now you and Ilyusha go after them, the next day.” I remembered blueberry pie - we always baked it on Sundays when the family was together. A picture of the leftovers of yesterday's pie popped up before my eyes, which, apparently, they will now treat us to ...
Today I don't have a job. Mordashov pays alimony for his son, but exactly as much as he sees fit. No statutory interest.
Once I read an article about Mordashov called "Steel Princess" in the Expert magazine. It was said there that Mordashov's name was not associated with any scandal. "He does not say anything about his first family. It is only known that he has a 14-year-old son from his first marriage." But about the beloved cat of Mr. Mordashov in that article, much more words were said than about the first son.
In the fall of 1999, my son and I accidentally saw a story on a local TV channel - congratulating Mordashov on his birthday. And they heard the phrase: "Today Alexei Alexandrovich has a double holiday - his son was born. We congratulate him on the heir." As if he had no eldest son, he deleted him from his life, even from the past ...
My son looked at me and said: "What did you expect from him, mom?" I would give dearly if my son did not see this story. Because my 15-year-old Ilya recently told me: “I don’t want to be like you. You are kind, you forgive everyone everything. That’s why your life is difficult and difficult. And only bastards like my dad achieve success” .
My son learned from everything that happened. He's just afraid. Afraid for me. Sometimes I say in my hearts that I will sue Mordashov in order to get what is due to me by law and be able to provide my son with a decent future, which he would have if his dad was with him. After all, this is what our family code says.
My son says: "No, don't. I'm scared for you, mom. Dad will tear your head off. And I have only you in this life."
But I'm not afraid. Because I don't want my son to be afraid of his own father, a rich, "civilized" man. In addition, this man is going to run for president of Russia in the next election ... I think it's time to ensure that neither the wife nor the children are afraid to ask what they are supposed to by law. After all, this is not about momentary marriages, but about those families where poverty and difficulties are together, and in a beautiful life there is only one husband. Today we have not only a class of rich men, but also a "layer" of wives and children abandoned by them.
Let's join forces to defend our rights in a civilized and legal way. I call on women to support me and create an organization that would really protect the rights of women in a difficult situation. I, Elena Mordashova, am ready to act as the initiator and driving force of this movement, maybe even the party. I hope that among those who respond, there will be a successful, well-known woman who can become the leader of this organization.
I know that from now on I will have serious problems. My ex-husband has defenders in Moscow who, for a substantial fee, will try to turn even the very force of the law against me. As usual, money is behind him, my son is behind me. Let's see who is stronger.
Sincerely, Elena Mordasheva
Wealth: $18.4 billion
Alexei Nikolsky/Press Service of the President of the Russian Federation/TASS
The richest man in Russia does not disclose the identity of his wife Lyudmila. It is known that the couple have a daughter, Victoria, a 25-year-old graduate of New York University, where she studied art history. The billionaire and shareholder of Russia's largest gas company Novatek adores his princess. 15 years ago, Mikhelson founded the Victoria Charitable Foundation, in which the girl is directly involved. But the relationship with the lawful wife of gossip raises questions. According to rumors, Mikhelson has not lived with his wife for a long time and the businessman has a second family - an unofficial wife named Olga, who gave birth to a son about 10 years ago.
Alexey Mordashov, 51 years old
Net worth: $17.5 billion
Owns the Utkonos online grocery store and a stake in the TUI tour operator. Mordashov, who is also the chairman of the board of directors of PJSC Severstal, has been divorced from his first wife for more than 20 years, and their separation is associated with a scandal. Alexey and Elena Mordashovs got married as students because of the bride's pregnancy. In 1985, their son Ilya was born, for the maintenance of which, during a divorce in 1996, Mordashov undertook to pay about 60 thousand rubles a month. The ex-wife also got an apartment in Cherepovets and a VAZ 2109 car. But in 2002, Elena Mordashova decided that something was going wrong, and in addition to the "nine" she tried to sue her ex-husband's share in his assets. The court refused the woman, after which the first-born billionaire took his mother's maiden name - Novitskaya.
The second wife of Mordashov was a colleague - also Elena, in a marriage with whom two sons Kirill and Nikita were born. A couple of years ago, there were rumors that, as in the first marriage, the entrepreneur again started an affair on the side and his mistress even became a mother.
Vladimir Lisin, 60 years old
Wealth: $16.1 billion
The chairman of the board of directors of the Novolipetsk Iron and Steel Works met his future wife at school! Vladimir and Lyudmila sat at the same desk, and then became the parents of three children. Lisin also leads the supervisory board of the Rumedea media holding, whose assets include the Business FM radio station.
Gennady Timchenko, 64 years old
Wealth: $16 billion
TASS/ Vyacheslav Prokofiev
Timchenko is the owner of the Volga Group investment group, which specializes in investments in energy, transport and infrastructure assets. Together with his wife Elena, the billionaire went through fire, water and St. Petersburg communal apartments, raised a son and two daughters and founded the Elena and Gennady Timchenko charitable foundation.
Alisher Usmanov, 63 years old
Wealth: $15.2 billion
TASS/ Valery Sharifulin
Irina Viner, president of the All-Russian Federation of Rhythmic Gymnastics, met her future husband (and future billionaire) at the Sports Palace of her native Tashkent, where she did gymnastics, and he did fencing, but young people began to meet later in Moscow, where Usmanov studied at MGIMO , and Wiener worked as a gymnastics coach. The businessman made an offer from prison: in 1980, Usmanov was sentenced to 8 years in the so-called "cotton case" (in 2000, the Supreme Court of Uzbekistan ruled that the sentence was unfair and found Usmanov not guilty). Usmanov sent a handkerchief to his bride, which, according to Uzbek custom, means an offer to marry. Usmanov, the owner of Metalloinvest, the largest mining company in the CIS, and Viner got married in 1992 (by that time, Irina had already managed to be married and give birth to a son, Anton).
Usmanov's assets also include the Baikal Mining Company, the Kommersant publishing house, shares in MegaFon and the Mail.ru Group holding.
Vagit Alekperov, 66 years old
Wealth: $14.5 billion
Ilya Pitalev/TASS
The president of Lukoil met his wife Larisa after graduating from the Azerbaijan Institute of Oil and Chemistry, when he worked as an oil field engineer. Larisa supported her husband when he built a career in the oil-producing Siberian villages, and shared his triumph when Alekperov was appointed deputy minister of the oil and gas industry of the USSR in 1990. In the same year, a son, Yusuf, was born in the family, who followed in his father's footsteps into the oil business.
Mikhail Fridman, 52 years old
Wealth: $14.4 billion
With his first and only wife Olga, with whom he studied on the same course at the Moscow Institute of Steel and Alloys, Fridman divorced more than 10 years ago. Friedman is a co-owner of Alfa Group, a member of the Supervisory Board of VimpelCom Ltd and the founder of the LetterOne holding, which invests in foreign oil and gas projects. At the same time, Friedman's fortune will not be inherited by his children. Mikhail has four children: daughters Laura and Katya, born in marriage, as well as son Sasha and daughter Nika Ozhelsky. All of them, according to Friedman, are able to independently achieve success in business, and he will donate his earned money to charity: “The worst thing I could do for my children is to give them a large amount. My capital should work for the benefit of society and be used for social purposes.
Vladimir Potanin, 56 years old
Wealth: $14.3 billion
TASS/ Rodionov Publishing House LLC
The basis of Potanin's fortune is shares in Norilsk Nickel. The ex-wife of the billionaire Natalya lived with him for more than 30 years. The couple have been together since high school graduation and raised three children. However, in 2011, Potanin had an illegitimate daughter, Varvara, and the businessman decided to marry the mother of the child, his subordinate named Ekaterina. “The divorce proposal came as a shock to me. I woke up with a complete stranger!” — admitted in an interview with GQ Natalia Potanina. The woman sued her ex-husband for alimony for her youngest son Vasily (now he is 17 years old) in the amount of 8.5 million rubles a month. Potanina also received three land plots, a house in the village of Vlasyevo in New Moscow and a house in the village of Ubory on Rublevka, as well as several million rubles. And in early March, Natalya demanded to recover 215 billion rubles from Potanin, compensating her shares of KM Invest, which were the joint property of the spouses, which means they should be divided.
The future billionaire was born on September 26, 1965 in the small town of Cherepovets, Vologda Oblast. Alexey's family is known for its products, namely children's toys. The family's works are exhibited in the Museum of Folk Toys in Sergiev Posad. Alexei's father- one of the three Mordashov brothers, who did not continue the family business and after graduating from school entered the Kharkov Polytechnic Institute, then worked as an electrical engineer at the Cherepovets Metallurgical Plant. Also, Alexei's mother worked at the metallurgical plant - Maria Fedorovna.
From childhood, parents instilled in their son a love of work and talked about all the nuances of the engineering profession. The future billionaire had the nickname "Template" at school, since he did everything "as expected", studied well, loved the exact sciences, was an excellent student in behavior, unlike his peers, he was always a neat and assiduous student.
Alexey Mordashov in his youth
Student years and early career
After graduating from high school with honors, he entered Leningrad Engineering and Economic Institute at the request of the parents. The young student had the great honor of listening to lectures from , well-known Russian politician. In his interviews, Aleksey Alexandrovich always mentions him, and says that he is very grateful to the teacher for the knowledge he has gained about economic mechanisms. And after the first year, the young student came to Anatoly Chubais as an assistant at the department, where he also learned a lot.
The future billionaire graduated from the university with honors. Since entering this university, for this profession, was at the request of his parents, he did not continue to study there. He completed 4 years of bachelor's degree, but did not go to graduate school. Being a young employer with absolutely no experience in this field, no one hired him in Leningrad, so he returned to his native Cherepovets.
Alexey Mordashov in his youth
Career
Alexey Mordashev went to work at his native Cherepovets Metallurgical Plant, as he spent all his childhood there with his parents. Thanks to the connections of his parents, he immediately got a job as a senior economist in the labor organization department. And in 1988 he was honored and he was the only one sent for an internship from the factory to Austria for 3 months. The director of the plant, Yuri Lipukhin, immediately noticed the young economist, and already in 1992 the future tycoon became the financial director of the plant.
The appointment of a young specialist caused negative feedback from the workers and residents of the small town, but Lipukhin, having a power of attorney from all the people of Cherepovets, assured that Mordashov would cope with the financial problems of the plant, and only on the trust of the director did the workers stop the rebellion.
Alexey Mordashov rapidly climbed the career ladder
Closer to the beginning of the new century, privatization began in Russia, Lipukhin entrusted the future oligarch to deal with an unfamiliar phenomenon, the young economist immediately took on this responsibility and set to work. He began to buy shares and vouchers from the workers of the plant and overdid it so much that the management of the plant went bankrupt.
The future billionaire came up with a scheme that was good only for his own hand: he created a structure Severstal-invest, where 80% of the shares belonged to him. And the official earned money to buy shares by reselling metal from the plant to the west. In order for the employees to sell their shares, he did not pay them six months of salary, so they had no choice. As a result of privatization, the capitalist received eighty-three percent of the shares of the Cherepovets Metallurgical Plant. The director of this plant, despite all the tricks of Alexei, considers him a good owner of the plant.
Alexey Mordashov - General Director of OAO Severstal
With his interest, the state official opened the well-known, already around the world,. Severstal is one of the leaders in ferrous metallurgy around the world. Being the general director of Severstal, the magnate set about reforming the plant. He completely changed the workforce, hired new specialists and got rid of the ballast of unprofitable firms that belonged to his company. Reduced the number of jobs from 50 to 37 thousand people. He did not restore outdated small enterprises, he immediately closed them in order to recover and get back to work with renewed vigor without being distracted by old firms. Launched modern production lines for the first time in Russia.
In December 2004, his company Severstal acquired the steel plant, which he saved from bankruptcy - this is the company and returned the production to its place in the industry. He also bought shares in the Ulyanovsk Automobile Plant, Olenegorsk Mining and Processing Plant, Karelsky Okatysh, Izhora Pipe Plant in St. Petersburg.
Alexey Mordashov at the Severstal plant
Personal life
The oligarch Mordashov has a "stormy" personal life and does not hide from the eyes of strangers. The future tycoon married for the first time, being in his second year at the university. They hid the reasons for early marriage for a long time, but as it turned out, his beloved woman was pregnant. The bride was several years older than him and was already in her fifth year at the university, herself a native of Irkutsk. In 1985 they were born son Ilya.
Alexey admitted that it was difficult to live in those days, because there was always not enough money, and the child was sick, so Alexey Alexandrovich worked part-time at the university department, wrote term papers for students. When Ilya was 11 years old, the family broke up. The reason for the divorce was the work of the official and his frequent betrayals.
Alexey Mordashov with his wife
But the oligarch did not forget his family and, after the divorce, left his wife and son a three-room apartment, a car, and every month he pays alimony in the amount of $ 1,000, and also every year he paid, separately to his son, $ 6,000 for recovery. The ex-wife had little alimony and possessions, and in 2002 Elena sued her ex-husband, demanding the division of property and the payment of alimony in the amount of 20 million, considering this compensation for 10 years of living together.
The press believes that the ex-wife did not file a lawsuit of her own free will, but was forced by her ex-husband's competitors: Oleg Deripaska and Iskander Makhmudov. By a court decision, all the shares of Severstal were seized, but influential people immediately intervened and the court rejected the application. The capitalist became angry with his ex-wife and decided to pay alimony to his son in the amount of 11,000 rubles. monthly, and decided to take revenge, lowered the payment of alimony for recovery, and put an arrest on Elena's apartment in Moscow. Ilya did not come into contact with his father after the divorce and took his mother's maiden name.
Alexey Mordashov with children and second wife
Second marriage billionaire was with an economist at the Chelyabinsk Combine - Elena, they signed in June 1997. She herself was born in 1971, graduated from the Leningrad Institute of the Textile Industry. In a marriage alliance with the oligarch, they had children Kirill born in 1999 and Nikita born in 2000. But the press claims that the official has a new wife named Larisa, with whom he has three more children. But the oligarch himself never hid that the family was never his top priority. He always said that he is a person and business and career come first for him.
State
Being a millionaire and having funds, Alexei still remains a prudent person. He does not own a yacht, flies on an ordinary plane of the company, wears not very expensive watches and clothes, and drives a stock car. He does not show his means on himself, but demonstrates them by deeds. He takes 12th place in the ranking of the richest businessmen of the Russian Federation, and in 2016 was named the richest man in Russia. In the ranking of the popular magazine, he is in second place among the richest people in Russia and in 51st place in the world.
Alexey Mordashov now
He has several large shares and holdings: Severgroup CJSC, Algorithm LLC, Regul LLC, Capital LLC, Holding Mining Company LLC, also has a joint-stock company Severstal Management. Since June 2013, he has been President of the Russian Steel non-profit partnership. And already in October 2013, he became Deputy Chairman of the Board of Directors of the World Association of Steel Manufacturers.
According to analysts, the official owns an online grocery store "Platypus", has a 15% stake in one of the major travel companies in Europe. Together with he manages Rossiya Bank, National Media Group and T2 RTK Holding. Alexey Alexandrovich's fortune is estimated at 13 billion dollars. He holds honorary doctorates from the University of Engineering and Economics in St. Petersburg and Northumbia University in the UK.
Work for Alexei Mordashov in the first place
Awards
The state official is a member of the Board of Trustees of the Bolshoi Theater and leads an active social life, is engaged in charity work. And in June 2016, the President of Russia awarded the tycoon with the badge of distinction “For Benevolence”, noting his huge contribution to charity. Alexey Alexandrovich also supports sports and primary children's organizations, invests in charitable foundations to support sick children and veterans.
Alexey Mordashov
Mordashov Alexey Alexandrovich - a man who, through hard work, zeal, went towards his goal and became one of the richest people in Russia and the world. He is called "Iron Man", because, despite all the obstacles in his path, he did not break, but proudly burst into the closed circle of billionaires. Many say that he has a “stranglehold”, and this is true, because it was thanks to her that he became the general director of one of the largest metallurgical enterprises in the Russian Federation, and the owners of many banks, shares and holdings.
In 1988 he graduated from the Leningrad Engineering and Economic Institute named after Togliatti. In 2001 he received an MBA from Northumbria University.
Alexei Mordashov is very different from most Russian billionaires. In his manner of doing business, he resembles the head of Siemens or General Electric rather than one of the heroes of the Russian era of primitive accumulation of capital. He forces all his managers to get an MBA degree abroad. In the late 1990s, his company was the largest McKinsey client in Eastern Europe, which he used not only for consulting but also as a talent pool. The general director of Severstal Group did not participate in any privatization scandals, he did not get into politics, until recently he lived not in Moscow, but in his native Cherepovets. Even when in 2001 competitors collected dirt on him, they only unearthed a sad story from his personal life - an abandoned first wife with a teenage son receiving meager alimony.
“We didn’t seize anything, we didn’t run into anyone, we didn’t use state bodies or corruption,” says Alexey Mordashov in an interview with Forbes. “Everything we bought, we bought with money.”
And only one story from Mordashov's past has so far remained a secret with seven seals. About how, in fact, he gained control of Severstal, only a few laconic statements by Mordashov himself were published.
Forbes was able to ask about this story of its second main participant, the hitherto silent ex-general director of the Cherepovets Metallurgical Plant, Yuri Lipukhin. From his stories, it becomes clear that Mordashov bought the shares of the plant, although for money, but not for his own. And his partner and, by the way, Lipukhin's godfather, deftly brushed aside.
The history of the privatization of Severstal is the history of two generations of managers, Soviet and post-Soviet, who won the younger and lost the older. Kind of like a remake of King Lear.
“Father will not pull all the skeletons out of the closet,” Lipukhin’s son Viktor warned us before giving us the coordinates of the former Severstal CEO. “He has both a love and a hate for the company.” Indeed, Yuri Lipukhin today speaks of the enterprise to which he devoted most of his life, with pain and pride, and about Mordashov, either with respect or with bitter resentment. “I entrusted the privatization of the plant to Alexei, and it was my mistake,” Lipukhin says ruefully in an interview with Forbes. - Because at one point he became a completely different person. He was not the master of his word.
The biography of the triumphant hero is widely known. Mordashov was born and grew up in Cherepovets. His mother worked at a metallurgical plant, and his father was one of its builders. In the early 1980s, he entered the Leningrad Institute of Engineering and Economics, where, by the way, he met Anatoly Chubais. In 1988, having returned to Cherepovets, he came to his native plant as a senior shop economist. The energetic young man was quickly noticed by his superiors. Mordashov was sent for a six-month internship at the Austrian steel company Voest Alpine.
Returning after an internship in 1990, Mordashov met with the general director of the plant. Lipukhin liked the budding economist for his cheerfulness and enterprise. “He had great proposals for restructuring. I saw that a person thinks, creatively approaches the matter, - says Lipukhin. — It was easier for the younger generation to build new economic relations. This required theoretical preparation and the absence of complexes that were typical for us.
True, Mordashov's promising career was almost interrupted at the very beginning. Together with him, the son of the Minister of Ferrous Metallurgy Serafim Kolpakov, Sergei, trained in Austria. “Alexey arranged something inappropriate, quarreled with him over trifles,” says Lipukhin.
Mordashov recalls this story with a laugh: “Well, yes, it was like that. He wanted to relax, and I wanted to study. And he complained to his father. The consequences, however, could be very serious for the future owner of Severstal. “The minister demanded that I remove him immediately,” says Lipukhin. - But I stood up for Alexei and slowly defended him. Then Alexei had a lot of such skirmishes. He is a hot-tempered, conflicted person.
Lipukhin attributed these qualities to the youth of his subordinate, and in 1992 he appointed 27-year-old Mordashov as director of finance and economics.
The company was going through hard times at the time. After the collapse of the USSR, Severstal lost its domestic sales market. The reorientation to export - and now the company exports about 40% of its products - began under Lipukhin.
“Traders appeared - including emigrants from Russia, all smart, energetic, who came to us and said: give us 10,000 tons of metal, we will buy it from you and sell it in China or Malaysia,” says Mordashov. We did not know the world market and did not receive a normal price. There was a period when steel was bought from us at $200 per ton and sold for $300 or $350.”
The traders got so rich skimming the cream off the steel mills that they soon began to take full control of the cash cows. The most predatory turned out to be Trans-World Group, which crushed most of the Russian aluminum and steel industries. TWG also took note of Severstal.
According to one of the managers of the plant, Vladimir Lisin, at that time one of the top managers of Trans-World, and now the main owner of the Novolipetsk Iron and Steel Works, first came to Cherepovets. Lisin allegedly came to discuss a project related to Moscow real estate, but Cherepovites believe that his mission was more of a reconnaissance one. Because after him, TWG chief Mikhail Chernoy himself rushed to the plant with proposals to organize trade financing and offshore schemes for the plant. Lipukhin refused Cherny, but he did not back down immediately. On behalf of TWG, young Iskander Makhmudov and Oleg Deripaska later visited Cherepovets with new proposals. However, they also received a turn from the gate. TWG did not fight hard for the plant - she had to act on too many fronts.
“There were a lot of objects for which there was a struggle, and they simply did not pay due attention to us,” says Mordashov. - And we lived very locally, we didn’t go anywhere. Often people called me, including representatives of large groups, and invited, say, to dinner in Moscow, but I simply did not answer the calls.
Traders, including Trans-World, offered Severstal managers assistance in the privatization of the enterprise. Having abandoned it, the Cherepovets team, however, applied the methods of TWG: they used trader structures to establish control over the plant. Mordashov easily convinced Lipukhin that the shares of the plant should be taken away for himself - in order to prevent outsiders from entering the enterprise.
Privatization began in 1993. A controlling stake of 51% was to be distributed among employees by closed subscription, and 29% were to be put up for a voucher auction. So the Lipukhin team had to urgently buy vouchers for all available money.
This is how they made money. Under the purchase of shares, the Severstal-Invest company was created. According to the law, enterprises in which state-owned companies had more than 25% could not participate in privatization. Therefore, the plant itself had only 24% in Severstal-Invest. The rest 76% was personally owned by Mordashov. Lipukhin proposed to create a core of shareholders from members of the board of directors and other "most respected people at the plant", but Mordashov dissuaded him. Yes, Lipukhin did not particularly insist. “Then few people understood privatization, they were afraid to get involved with it,” recalls Mordashov.
The plant sold metal to Severstal-Invest at low prices. The trading company used a huge margin from its resale to buy vouchers, and at the same time shares from workers. “I was practically trading with myself,” says Lipukhin. - I could set any prices, you understand? I saw, of course, that this is the purest… that this is a fictitious work, not quite correct commerce. However, I controlled the actions of this company, provided it with goods and loans, protected it from all controlling organizations, from the tax inspectorate, ministries, and currency control.
According to Lipukhin, Severstal-Invest not only received metal at reduced prices, but also took large loans from the plant. Money accumulated quickly. And as a result of the voucher auction, the managers of Severstal managed to get almost the entire block of shares put up for auction. Competitors again underestimated the Cherepovets privatizers.
“Our competitors, apparently, decided that we were a weak team that accidentally got hooked on something at the plant, and thought: well, let it sit there for a while, we’ll deal with it later,” recalls Mordashov, not without malice.
Over time, Severstal-Invest bought out almost all the shares from the workforce. “Then there were very difficult times, often they did not pay wages, and people willingly sold their shares,” recalls Lipukhin. Without mentioning at the same time that part of the money that went to Severstal-Invest due to the plant's low selling prices could have been used to pay the same salaries.
Lipukhin says that he did not seek to become the owner of the plant. "I did not set out to become the owner of the plant, although this would not have been a problem." Didn't he fear the fact that he was giving control of the shares to Mordashov? Lipukhin says that he absolutely trusted his subordinate: “Alexey was completely different at that time. He understood that everything depended on me, and he had one answer to everything: as you say, so be it. To this talented and obedient manager, the 60-year-old director was ready to give up his place: “I have already worked out. It's time to look for a replacement."
In 1996, Mordashov became the CEO of Severstal, and Lipukhin took over as chairman of the board of directors. It was then that he finally took care of the formal ownership of the shares. Those 43% of the shares of Severstal, which by that time had been accumulated by Severstal-Invest, were transferred to another structure - Severstal-Garant, 51% owned by Mordashov, 49% by Lipukhin.
At first, according to Lipukhin, they agreed on equal shares: “When I decided to leave, I told him - express your proposals on how to divide these shares. He says equally. I say okay, I agree. After he became a director, he and his friends went to some islands, walked for a week, and when he returned, he came and said: equally not quite normal for me, give you 49%, and me 51%. I didn't care. I said, come on, I agree.
Thanks to Lipukhin's compliance, there was no quarrel between the partners. When Mordashov was baptized in 1997, Lipukhin became his godfather. But even then, the ex-director understood: the charter of Severstal-Garant did not give him any opportunity to influence the management of Severstal shares. “Alexey received the combine on a plate with a blue border,” Lipukhin says bitterly. “I simply gave the plant to him and faded into the background.”
The conflict between the two privatizers emerged after the 1998 default. With the devaluation of the ruble, the business of the plant went uphill sharply - after all, its costs were calculated in rubles, and the proceeds were mainly in foreign currency. Net profit rose from $111 million in 1997 to $453 million in 2000. What to do with this profit - because of this, the partners quarreled.
“I had a strategy - to develop the plant, restore production, improve the environment,” says Lipukhin. - But Alexei considered it a disastrous affair. The development of the plant was curtailed, and God knows what began.
Mordashov followed the path of creating a diversified holding company, later named Severstal Group, and began to buy up industrial assets: shares in the St. Petersburg, Tuapse and Vostochny ports, coal mines, as well as railway cars, the Kolomna Diesel Locomotive Plant, the UAZ plant. Mordashov explains the desire to diversify the business by the need to smooth out the cyclicality of the steel business.
It was at this time that Mordashov did away with the principle of collegial management of the plant's shares. “In the spring of 1999, he arbitrarily, without my knowledge, bought back 17% of the shares that belonged to Severstal-Invest,” says Lipukhin. - I went up to him and said: Alyosha, you can’t act like that. His answer was extremely short: it was not written anywhere.”
That's why Lipukhin is still offended by his successor and accuses him of violating this word. Mordashov denies any gentlemen's agreements with Lipukhin. He believes that he acted extremely honestly in relation to the ex-director. “His fate differs from the fate of other old directors in that he was not expelled from the plant as a result of privatization,” says Mordashov. — On the contrary, Lipukhin became one of the largest shareholders of the company. I didn’t take everything for myself, although legally I could do it.”
Diversifying the business, Mordashov for the first time in his career got involved in a tough competition. The Zavolzhsky Motor Plant, a supplier of engines for GAZ, became the subject of his conflict with the owner of GAZ, Oleg Deripaska. With the head of Evrazholding, Alexander Abramov, Mordashov fought for Kuzbassugol. Another of his rivals - for dominance in the metallurgical market - was Iskander Makhmudov. At Severstal, they believe that it was he who financed the litigation with Mordashov of his ex-wife. Makhmudov's entourage does not comment on this.
One way or another, these lawsuits made Mordashov think about protecting property. And in early 2001, he asked Lipukhin to give him his 49% stake in Severstal-Garant. The ex-director claims that he received six times less for this package than he could have earned on the market. Mordashov does not name the price of the transaction, after which he became almost the sole owner of Severstal, but flatly denies that he bought the shares at such a discount.
Lipukhin still monitors the state of affairs at the plant, where he worked for 42 years, 15 of them as a director. “Blast furnace number four is standing still, the by-product coke plant is in a bad state, the section rolling shop produces a third of what it can produce,” he complains. “Today, the plant produces 3 million tons of rolled products less than in 1990, although the country is experiencing an acute shortage of metal - metal prices in Russia are almost the highest in the world.”
And yet, Mordashov, having expanded his industrial empire, now largely follows the advice of his predecessor: he again realized that the main business of Severstal is metallurgy. To gain access to the American market, Mordashov defeated U.S. Steel in the fight for the bankrupt Rouge Industries, one of the largest steel companies in the United States, founded in the 1920s by Henry Ford.
“The American market is the most demanding in terms of quality,” Mordashov explains the purchase of Rouge for $285 million. “Working with such a consumer is very important in order to raise the standards of our products.”
Someone will say that the main owner of Severstal - now Mordashov and related companies have 83% of the shares - dealt harshly with the person who at one time raised him and entrusted him with control over the plant. But against the background of the bloody showdowns of those years, the history of Severstal looks like an exception. At the Cherepovets plant there was no shooting, no court squabbles. Lipukhin turned out to be too decent a person, and Mordashov, as a Western-style manager, showed himself not so bad.
Billionaires do not want to give ex-wives neither money nor children
Until recently, the most popular books in Russia were entertaining and teaching aids called "How to Marry an Oligarch." Now they are gathering dust on the shelves. All the oligarchs have already been dismantled. In this regard, other brochures - "How to divorce an oligarch" - have become relevant. According to statistics, every second Rublev wife goes through this. "Express newspaper" made the top ten most interesting cases.
THE VERY FIRST
After the divorce, Elena Mordashova devoted her life to extracting alimony from her ex-husband.
A second-year student of the Leningrad Civil Engineering Institute, an excellent student and a Lenin scholarship holder, got married Alyosha Mordashov in the fifth year Lena Mityukova, as they say, on the fly.
Family, child and unloading of wagons at night did not prevent him from successfully completing his studies and being distributed in his native Cherepovets. The constant lack of money forced me to work hard for three. The authorities appreciated this, and climbing the career ladder went as if by itself. At first - a senior economist, then - director of economics and finance at Severstal. By the age of 28, he was a deputy general, with all the privileges due, like secretaries, whose lipstick on her husband's collar was an eyesore to Elena.
On June 1, 1996, they divorced. Alexey decided to leave the child Mityukova, and in order for him to grow up in abundance, he gave his ex-wife a three-room apartment and a “nine”. In addition, alimony - $ 1000 monthly plus another $ 6 thousand a year - for treatment and rest. The money was fantastic in those days.
In 2002, Elena Mordashova found out that her ex-husband was an oligarch and turned over not thousands, but billions of dollars. Lawyers helped her draw up a lawsuit, according to which she demanded to pay alimony not by agreement, but by law - 25 percent of real income. But the court denied Mordashova's claim, recognizing the previously signed agreements as legal. However, the owner of Severstal still increased the alimony to $100,000 per month.
THE MOST GENEROUS
Roman Abramovich left his wife much more than he could have.
FROM Irina Malandina Abramovich met on board the plane, where a spectacular blue-eyed blonde worked as a flight attendant. Irina noticed him among the first class passengers and hinted at the opportunity to have a good time after the flight. Roman agreed and a few months later announced to his first wife Olga Lysova about divorce. After three years of marriage, she was unable to give birth to a child and seemed to be waiting for her husband to leave. But Irina will more than make this dream come true, having given birth to Roman Arkadyevich in 15 years of marriage, five children: Arkady, Ilya, Anna, Sonya and Arina.
Like the first wife, who organized a business with Abramovich - the production of toys, Malandina quickly got involved in making money. Irina began to bring fashionable things from Europe to Moscow, which in the early 90s were in huge deficit. They were copied at Roman's small factory and sold. In 2003, the Abramovich family moved to London. Roman's income during this period was already in the billions.
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Irina quickly gained a reputation as one of the most stylish inhabitants of Britain. And I didn't think about any Dashakh Zhukov! A pretty young lady destroyed an exemplary marriage in less than a year. The divorce was predicted to be loud and scandalous - $ 18 billion is at stake!
But it turned out that formally Abramovich has practically nothing. All property - houses, castles and yachts in the UK and France, as well as shares of enterprises - is registered offshore and recorded in children. They can use their state only when they reach adulthood.
But it’s not in Abramovich’s character to trifle - the list of property transferred to his wife is impressive:
Five-story mansion in London's Belgravia - $20 million
Fining Hill Estate in West Sussex, UK - $33.6 million
Mansion in Saint-Tropez on the Cote d'Azur in France - $18 million
Chateau de la Croix, located on the Cape d'Antibes in France - $30 million
Villa on Rublyovka - $16 million
Yacht "Pelorus" - $150 million
THE LOUDEST
Instead of children, Viktor BATURIN generously offered Yana RUDKOVSKY the rights to Dima BILAN.
Head of the agricultural holding "Inteko-Agro" Viktor Baturin and producer Dmitry Bilan Yana Rudkovskaya lived together for six years. It took them so much to understand that they did not agree in character. Victor took the first step towards divorce. Two years ago, he did not let Yana go home. To his sons - 6-year-old Andrei and 5-year-old Nikolai - he explained his act with a desire to protect them from the corrupting influence of a walking mother. Baturin did not come up with anything better than moving with his children to the estate of the princes Golitsyn in the village of Zubrilovka, Penza region.
The high-profile litigation lasted almost a year. Yana tried to take the children and $150 million from Victor. Instead, Baturin offered the rights to Bilan and a share in the business. As a result, Yana received the rights to Bilan, a $21 million business in Sochi and $5 million to set up a future family with Evgeni Plushenko. The court ruled that the children should live with their mother.
THE FRESHEST
The wife of Dmitry RYBOLOVLEV claims that the oligarch is hiding almost $9 billion from the state.
Until recently, co-owner of Uralkali Dmitry Rybolovlev with a fortune of $ 3.1 billion, he was ranked 13th among the Russian rich, according to Forbes. A divorce from his wife Elena can throw him far back. She said that she was "fed up with Dmitry's tenderness for other women," and stated that her husband was hiding the company's assets. And his real fortune is $6-12 billion. Elena demands half of this money as compensation for her youth lost with her loving husband. Needless to say, she didn't lose much. Since 1995, she has lived in Switzerland with her two daughters and traveled the world in search of antiques and interesting real estate. In particular, she persuaded Dmitry to buy the estate from a billionaire Donald Trump in Florida for $100 million.
The most expensive property in the United States is located on the Atlantic coast on a 2.6 hectare site and has a private beach 145 meters long. There are two guest houses on the territory, and in the main mansion there are only 18 bedrooms. The total area of \u200b\u200bliving premises is more than 3 thousand square meters. Elena Rybolovleva proposes to transfer this mansion to trust management. In addition, she claims half of 65.5 percent of her husband's shares in Uralkali. If she manages to sue half of the business from her husband, then the Rybolovlevs' divorce will become the most expensive in the world.
Until recently, the family of the co-owner of Fininvest, a member of the Federation Council of the Russian Federation Vladimir Slutsker and creators of a network of fitness centers Olga Slutsker considered exemplary. Two children, a mutual passion for art objects, it would seem, what else is needed! But now the senator in a statement of claim requires his wife to share with him apartments in Moscow and St. Petersburg, houses and plots in the Moscow region, shares of the World Class Clubs fitness club chain. As well as works of art - paintings by Andy Warhol, photographs by Helmut Newton, Damien Hirst's "Saints and Sinners" for $ 2 million and many others. But most importantly, the senator demands that he leave his children, 6-year-old Anya and 10-year-old Mikhail.
According to recent publications on the Internet, this is what former personal driver Olga Slutsker, USSR kickboxing champion Alexei Medvedev says about the reason for the divorce:
In general, I was surprised at the patience of her husband. Vladimir flew away on vacation with his children to ski in Austria. Literally the next day after his departure, Olga brought her lover to the house and had fun with him in the house and in the bathhouse for two days. All this happened in front of the guards and domestic servants. Everyone was shocked! Naturally, upon arrival, the husband found out everything and immediately filed for divorce.
According to Medvedev, Olga also met with her lover in a rented apartment on Vernadsky Avenue and at the Ritz-Carlton Hotel on Tverskaya.
She often met with Suleiman Kerimov, flew to him in Nice, sailed with him on a yacht, - Medvedev allegedly claims. - During the filming of the sports TV show "Big Races" often went to the apartment to Dmitry Nagiyev in a high-rise building on Kotelnicheskaya embankment. She usually stayed there for 2-3 hours and each time came out very excited. And in the car straightened her hair and tinted her lips.
They had a peculiar relationship with Kerimov. She often talked to him from the car on the phone in front of me. It looked like she was for him something like a "madam" to ensure contacts with female celebrities. From the conversations, it could be concluded that Olga helps Kerimov to "get to know" her friends from the secular party. I noticed that often after such successful negotiations, she called the bank and checked the receipt of payments in her account.
It is possible, however, that Vladimir Iosifovich Slutsker, who recently adopted, as a follower of Kabbalah, the name Moshe Shlomo, will be limited only to the deprivation of Olga's parental rights.
I'm not greedy, because I'm a Kabbalist, - once said a member of the Federation Council of the Russian Federation.
THE SMALLEST
The head of Rosgosstrakh got rid of his wife with alimony alone, and could have lost more than $100 million.
Wife Anna ceased to satisfy the head of Rosgosstrakh Danila Khachaturova in 2004. He did not hide this and bought himself a separate apartment. After a couple of years of pushing around between the family, where 14-year-old son Artem grew up, and a single life, Khachaturov filed a lawsuit for divorce. Some ladies of the demimonde believe that his current wife pushed the billionaire to this Ulyana Sergienko. The girl came to conquer Moscow from distant Ust-Kamenogorsk and more than succeeded. Khachaturov was in such a hurry to enjoy his honeymoon that he instantly agreed to pay Anna a lump sum of alimony in the amount of $ 2 million for four years, which remained until their son came of age. At the same time, he obtained from his ex-wife that she signed a statement on the absence of any property subject to division. What prevented the division of the commercial assets of their enterprises: City Mortgage Bank, Northern Sea Port, Rosgosstrakh, Rinocenter and others for a total amount, according to Forbes magazine, of $ 2 billion.
Anna waved the agreement. But realizing that much more could be obtained from her husband, she sued him, where she tried to challenge half of the funds received by Danil Eduardovich from the sale of the City Mortgage Bank - at least $ 200 million. She also announced that her husband was hiding part of her income, but, apart from trouble and hassle, she achieved nothing.
MOST MALE
Former Presidential Plenipotentiary Representative in the Southern Federal District Viktor Kazantsev sued his ex-wife for chicken meat.
Kazantsev filed for divorce from his wife Tamara in early 2006. After a month of single life, he came to the conclusion that his wife got rid of him too easily, and sued her and her daughter Margarita, demanding 60 percent of the shares of the Kanevskaya meat and poultry plant. In 2003, they were bought for 58 million rubles and registered in the name of Kazantseva, Jr., but, as Kazantsev stated, the share in the enterprise was acquired with money that was loaned to him, and therefore the shares should belong to him. Three weeks later, his claim was granted. Chicken soup politics is now cooked by another.
MOST SPONTANEOUS
Caught with his granddaughter's governess, Aleksey Isaykin gave his wife everything except for Volga-Dnepr shares.
Alexey Isaikin fell in love with Lydia at first sight and already on the second date made an offer. Lydia understood that this handsome, intelligent and purposeful guy was the best in the whole world. Young people barely waited until they turned 18 to register their relationship. The happy marriage lasted 36 years. The house is not something that prosperity - excess.
The head and co-owner of the Volga-Dnepr airline, the chairman of the board of directors of Aviastar, Alexei Isaikin, was called the richest man in the Ulyanovsk region. A little more, and he would have been preparing to meet a dignified old age, surrounded by two daughters and grandchildren, but suddenly he began life anew.
What he liked about the governess of his granddaughter, his relatives still do not understand. An ordinary Ulyanovsk girl - every second one in the pedagogical institute!
In 2004, Isaikin left home with one diplomat. Through lawyers, he offered his wife a divorce and a $3,000 monthly pension. But Lydia demanded half of the airline's stake. According to various estimates, this is several tens of millions of dollars.
The case did not reach the court. Alexey Ivanovich persuaded his ex-wife to agree to a mansion in London, an apartment in Moscow and a house in Ulyanovsk, plus an amount sufficient for Lydia to continue to be considered the richest grandmother in the Ulyanovsk region.
MOST SUSPICIOUS
The divorce of the aluminum tycoon Lev CHERNOY with his wife Lyudmila took place under the scrutiny of Interpol.
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At the end of 1998, the coordinator of the huge industrial empire "Trans World Group" - a shareholder of all large aluminum plants, Bratsk, Krasnoyarsk, Sayan and others - a billionaire Lev Black and his brothers, Mikhail and David, fell under the suspicion of the Swiss prosecutor's office. They were given the fashionable label "Russian mafia" and tried to accuse them of drug trafficking, organizing prostitution, racketeering and buying stolen goods. Leo's wife Lyudmila said she did not want to have anything to do with such a person. And right in their London mansion, where she lived under the hood of Interpol on suspicion of preparing an attempt on her own husband, she wrote an application for divorce and division of property. Chernoy's fortune at the beginning of 1999 was estimated by her spouse at $3.5 billion. Lyudmila demanded half.
The divorce was accompanied by several more unsuccessful attempts on Chernoy's life and ended in the complete satisfaction of the wife's claim. Lyudmila received a house in London and $ 150 million - exactly half of what Interpol managed to recognize as the property of a businessman.
The end of the divorce coincided with the removal of all charges by the prosecutor's office - both from Lyudmila and from the Cherny brothers. It is noteworthy that together with his wife Chernaya, he also lost the aluminum business.
THE MOST DEVOTED
Mikhail Khodorkovsky's first wife sends him parcels.
With Elena Khodorkovsky studied at the Moscow Institute of Chemical Technology. The future spouses felt an irresistible attraction at one of the Komsomol meetings. They also decided to formalize the relationship according to all the rules. Mikhail was deputy secretary of the Komsomol committee and never allowed himself anything frivolous. In 1985, their son Pavel was born, and in 1990 the family broke up. Khodorkovsky helped his wife open a travel company and still supports his eldest son, Pavel. In gratitude, Elena still bears the name of her ex-husband and sends him parcels and long letters.
THE MOST UNPROSPECTIVE
After a divorce from billionaire Shalva CHIGIRINSKY, wife Tatyana PANCHENKOVA can only receive his debts.
Divorce proceedings between a well-known entrepreneur Shalva Chigirinsky, who just a year ago was on the 58th line of the Russian "Forbes" with a fortune of $ 2.3 billion, and his wife Tatyana Panchenkova took place in April of this year. However, the economic crisis still got ahead of Tatyana and did not allow her to profit from more or less decent compensation. It suddenly turned out that most of the billionaire's assets were the subject of litigation. The court has already seized the businessman’s accounts, real estate, including a mansion in London, a villa in Monaco that previously belonged to the cannibalistic dictator Bokassa, and two Moscow apartments, as well as a collection of antique watches and a private jet named by Chigirinsky in honor of his wife - “Tatik”.