The Alfa Bank is preparing a deal for Russian billionaires Mikhail Fridman and Peter Aven to sell their controlling shares in the company, the bank’s press department has told Kommersant.
“As far as we are concerned, such a deal is indeed being developed. It is too soon to announce the deal has been completed, as the sides need to go through a series of corporate and legal procedures,” the press department says.
The Financial Times reported on the deal yesterday, citing its sources.
The decision to sell the shares might help the two to have Western sanctions removed for them. “They want to do everything they can to get out of their Russian assets so that sanctions will be removed,” one of the people with knowledge of the transaction told The Financial Times.
So far, Fridman and Aven have received no indication that selling Alfa-Bank will convince the EU to remove the sanctions.
The new owner of the bank is reported to be Andrey Kosogov, a business partner of Fridman and Aven, for a fee of $2.3 billion, according to The Financial Times.
