Kharon began tracking a Luxembourg-based holding company, Altair Holding S.A., as far back as July 2023—a year and a half before the U.S. designated an Altair-owned Kyrgyz bank for its role in a scheme to evade Russia sanctions. Last week, the U.K. designated Altair itself for the same reason.
That latest move, targeting a company within EU borders, underscored the West’s growing crackdown on Russia sanctions circumvention. Yet Altair and its broader network reflect how Russian business has continued to find facilitators and safe havens for its money in Western Europe and Central Asia, three and a half years into the country’s bloody war in Ukraine.
Starting with Altair and its low-profile owner, Kharon traced a spectrum of Russian international interests, connecting to a billionaire’s empire that was jolted by a curious Russian court case, one that appeared less a matter of law than of leverage.
The manager: According to the most recently available corporate disclosures, the owner of Altair Holding is Eriks Martinovskis, a Latvian-born, Luxembourg-based businessman who specializes in financial management, both across the businesses he owns and across others he manages.
One of the only photographs that Kharon could identify of Martinovskis was from January 2020, at a gala for Russian speakers in the financial industry. According to corporate records, he has worked as a manager for several European branches of Russian companies, including a subsidiary of Gazprom, the majority-state-owned energy giant.
But Martinovskis’s key connection here is less direct: He manages three Luxembourg companies that ultimately preside over the Western European wing of Azimut Hotels, one of Russia’s largest hospitality brands, with a footprint that straddles both domestic and international markets.
That latest move, targeting a company within EU borders, underscored the West’s growing crackdown on Russia sanctions circumvention. Yet Altair and its broader network reflect how Russian business has continued to find facilitators and safe havens for its money in Western Europe and Central Asia, three and a half years into the country’s bloody war in Ukraine.
Starting with Altair and its low-profile owner, Kharon traced a spectrum of Russian international interests, connecting to a billionaire’s empire that was jolted by a curious Russian court case, one that appeared less a matter of law than of leverage.
The manager: According to the most recently available corporate disclosures, the owner of Altair Holding is Eriks Martinovskis, a Latvian-born, Luxembourg-based businessman who specializes in financial management, both across the businesses he owns and across others he manages.
One of the only photographs that Kharon could identify of Martinovskis was from January 2020, at a gala for Russian speakers in the financial industry. According to corporate records, he has worked as a manager for several European branches of Russian companies, including a subsidiary of Gazprom, the majority-state-owned energy giant.
But Martinovskis’s key connection here is less direct: He manages three Luxembourg companies that ultimately preside over the Western European wing of Azimut Hotels, one of Russia’s largest hospitality brands, with a footprint that straddles both domestic and international markets.
According to archived webpages reviewed by Kharon, Altair Holding shares an address and a phone number with the TGR Group, a sanctions-evasion and money-laundering network that catered to Russian elites. The U.S. sanctioned it in December.
The billionaire: Azimut entered Western Europe in 2008 and went on to operate mainly within Austria and Germany. It successively sold off its European hotel portfolio after the start of the war in Ukraine, though the corporate vehicles behind those assets remain active.
The Azimut brand’s founder, Aleksandr Klyachin, is a Russian real estate magnate whom Forbes has ranked in the past as one of the country’s wealthiest businessmen.
The Azimut brand’s founder, Aleksandr Klyachin, is a Russian real estate magnate whom Forbes has ranked in the past as one of the country’s wealthiest businessmen.
- Klyachin’s son Ilya Klyachin is a leader of Azimut’s European branch; some Russian sourcing describes Ilya as its owner.
- Aleksandr Klyachin controls the Azimut business and owns its Russian wing.
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But Aleksandr Klyachin’s reported net worth has dipped in recent years, after Russia brought eyebrow-raising charges against him in spring 2023 related to the alleged non-payment of taxes by the company RusOil. Forbes in Russia reported that a Klyachin representative “emphasized that the businessman was never a beneficiary of the Rus-Oil company or other oil companies.”
Nonetheless, as the first year of international sanctions squeezed its wartime economy, the Russian state seized much of Klyachin’s real estate empire. It also briefly took control of the Russian side of Azimut Hotels.
The European side, however, remained untouched, fully accessible to Klyachin.
The comeback: It’s unclear what took place in the interim, but this past spring Klyachin reportedly agreed to reacquire his nationalized companies from the Federal Property Management Agency, at well under market value.
But Russian institutional actors had gained a cut.
A new company, KR Plus LLC, now owns much of Klyachin’s real estate assets across Russia. While KR Plus’s ownership and leadership have been redacted in Russian corporate records, industry sources and government documents reviewed by Kharon show that Klyachin holds a 49% stake in it. The other 51% belongs to a firm indirectly owned by Sberbank Capital LLC, a U.S.-sanctioned subsidiary of widely sanctioned Sberbank.
Nonetheless, as the first year of international sanctions squeezed its wartime economy, the Russian state seized much of Klyachin’s real estate empire. It also briefly took control of the Russian side of Azimut Hotels.
The European side, however, remained untouched, fully accessible to Klyachin.
The comeback: It’s unclear what took place in the interim, but this past spring Klyachin reportedly agreed to reacquire his nationalized companies from the Federal Property Management Agency, at well under market value.
But Russian institutional actors had gained a cut.
A new company, KR Plus LLC, now owns much of Klyachin’s real estate assets across Russia. While KR Plus’s ownership and leadership have been redacted in Russian corporate records, industry sources and government documents reviewed by Kharon show that Klyachin holds a 49% stake in it. The other 51% belongs to a firm indirectly owned by Sberbank Capital LLC, a U.S.-sanctioned subsidiary of widely sanctioned Sberbank.
What it means: The reshuffle compromised Klyachin’s control over his Russia-based assets. That leaves his EU-based financial network as a valuable potential well for capital to spend in Russia and internationally—even without European hotels under it.
The bottom line: Despite sanctions and political ruptures, some Russian elites have managed to preserve substantial assets in Europe, often through opaque and circuitous holding structures. They’ve also continued to find willing markets elsewhere.
Last month, withdrawn from Austria and Germany but still under Klyachin’s control, Azimut Hotels announced that it had taken over management of “an iconic five-star hotel” in the center of Uzbekistan’s capital city. “It will become,” a press release said, “the chain’s first premium property in Central Asia.”
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The bottom line: Despite sanctions and political ruptures, some Russian elites have managed to preserve substantial assets in Europe, often through opaque and circuitous holding structures. They’ve also continued to find willing markets elsewhere.
Last month, withdrawn from Austria and Germany but still under Klyachin’s control, Azimut Hotels announced that it had taken over management of “an iconic five-star hotel” in the center of Uzbekistan’s capital city. “It will become,” a press release said, “the chain’s first premium property in Central Asia.”
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