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HOLIDAY POSTCARD – WHAT IS SULEIMAN KERIMOV GOING TO DO WITHOUT HIS YACHT AND BEACH HOUSE?

By John Helmer, Moscow

It seems that this August Suleiman Kerimov will be holidaying with his Mother, as in Motherland.

A recent yachting news bulletin from the port of Bergen, Norway, reports that Kerimov’s motor yacht is “docked next to Bryggen, in walking distance to most of the attractions in the center of Bergen. The yacht ICE is registered in the Cayman Islands and was previously owned by Russian billionaire Suleyman Kerimov.” Kerimov had put the boat up for sale last year, when his New York lawyer, Eliot Lauer, claimed it wasn’t really his. Here’s [1] the yacht-for-sale story, and here’s [2] Kerimov’s response through his lawyer. But that was last autumn, when the going price for M/Y was €200 million.

Here is the Ice at dock in Bergen.

But it isn’t in Bergen this week. According to the yacht plots of a reliable source, the Ice is currently in Sardinia. The source also says he hasn’t seen evidence that Kerimov has sold the Cayman Island company which owns and registers M/Y Ice. “It may have been a gift. It may have been a private transaction. It may not have happened.” In the yacht market, the vessel isn’t being marketed. Its replacement cost at present is estimated at more than €100 million.

As reported [3] last October also, Kerimov has commissioned another yacht, the M/YAir. At the moment, the Air is in Greece, according to radar and other tracking data. It is being chartered to paying customers, and it isn’t clear to sources whether a Kerimov company is the beneficiary of the business, a bank, or a go-between them.

A source in Nice, on the French Mediterranean coast, reports that Kerimov’s villa in the vicinity is still for sale. This was the house when it was apparently on offer nine months ago [4].

The current source claims that renovation contractors have been working to upgrade the villa and and garden. Unfortunately, during these works inMay there was an accident, when a trellis weighing more than a tonne fell on the head of one of the workers. The accident report described the owner of the villa property as “a certain Alexander Studhalter”. Studhalter [5] of Lucerne is a longtime friend and business associate of Kerimov’s.

Here is a glimpse inside the Kerimov compound taken after the accident.

Kerimov’s offices in Moscow and lawyer Lauer in New York were asked to confirm details of the property disposals. Anton Averin, spokesman for Kerimov’s Nafta-Moskva, has gone on vacation, an assistant said, and there is noone else to speak for Kerimov. At Kerimov’s office at the Federation Council, where he is a senator for Dagestan, spokesman Alexei Krasovskiy said he doesn’t know anything about Kerimov’s personal life, but will relay the questions. If Kerimov wants to, Krasovskiy said, he will reply.