Arkady Volozh, co-founder and CEO of the Yandex group of companies, is leaving all his duties at the company and its international subsidiaries. This decision was taken after the European Union included the businessman on the sanctions list.
Yandex announced that Arkady Volozh is leaving the board of directors and CEO of the Yandex group of companies, as well as senior positions in the group’s international subsidiaries.
Yandex described the European Commission’s decision as unfair and expressed confidence that it would not affect the company’s operations.
“With the help of Yandex, our millions of users will continue to search and find information, use taxi services and deliver goods, food and medicine, watch movies, listen to music, study and much more,” the company said.
They emphasized that the sanctions imposed on Volozh do not apply to Yandex’s parent company, Yandex NV, or its subsidiaries, as the businessman is not a controlling shareholder.
“Arkady Volozh, through a family trust, owns 45.3 percent of the votes and 8.6 percent of the economic share of Yandex NV. Instructions on how to vote with these shares.”
At the same time, Volozh will continue to help Yandex, but will not give any instructions or advice to the trust on voting, decisions will continue to be made by the board of directors.
“This decision is in the interest of the company and its stakeholders,” said Volozh. According to him, he will protect the interests of the company and all its shareholders.
The businessman also described the European Commission’s decision as illogical, “erroneous and ultimately inefficient”.
The sanctions include freezing assets, as well as prohibiting the provision of financial and economic resources.
Volozh is the main shareholder of Yandex, owns 86.24% of group B shares (these are “controller” shares, but there are almost no A-list shares traded). “Controlling” shares provide 45.27% of the vote.
Prior to that, EU sanctions were imposed on Tigran Khudaverdyan, who served as the company’s managing director. After being blacklisted, Khudaverdyan left his post and resigned from Yandex’s board of directors.
EU sanctions
On the afternoon of June 3, the EU announced that Arkady Volozh was placed on the sanctions list, declaring that the CEO of Yandex is “a major businessman working in sectors of the economy that provide an important source of income for the Russian government.” Federation.”
According to the European Commission, it “supports the government financially or financially and is responsible for supporting actions or policies that undermine or destabilize Ukraine.”
Yandex is the largest Internet company in Russia, the operator of the most popular search engine in Russia. He said that Russian state banks such as AB, Sberbank and VTB are shareholders and investors of Yandex.
In addition, in 2019 the company agreed to a restructuring that gave the “golden stake” to the Public Interest Fund, where the Russian government gained veto power over key decisions.
“Through the FRI, the Russian government can veto certain issues, such as the sale of its own intellectual property and the sale or transfer of personal data of Russian users to foreign companies,” the text of the EU Official Journal states.
Yandex is also responsible for promoting Russian state media and narratives in search results, and for downing and deleting “content critical of the Kremlin”, including “about Russia’s aggression in Ukraine,” according to the EU.
The compilers of the sanction list also noted that Volozh has Russian and Maltese citizenship.
In total, 18 legal entities and 65 persons from Russia were included in the black list of the European Union. In addition to Volozh, the restrictions affected the press secretary of Russian President Dmitry Peskov, his wife Tatyana Navka and their children Elizaveta and Nikolai, as well as the chairman of the board of the National Media Group Alina Kabaeva and several dozen others. Russian military personnel. As for legal entities, the list specifically included JSC Oboronenergo, Voentelecom, Voentorg, Kamaz, Tatneft-Neftekhim and Remdizel.
Shares of ‘Yandex’ crashed
After the news about Volozh’s inclusion on the sanctions list, the value of Yandex shares on the Moscow Stock Exchange has fallen to a minimum since April 2017.
As of 16:25 Moscow time, the company’s shares fell by 14.17% and were trading at 1,366 rubles per share. By 16:50 the decline slowed down to 7.4% (1465 rubles).
In March, Forbes reported that Arkady Volozh lost $2 billion in three months and ceased to be a dollar billionaire.
Russia – in the list of 200 richest businessmen in 2021 took 64th place with a fortune of $ 2.3 billion, and its maximum capital was estimated at $ 2.6 billion, according to the publication, in March, its capital amounted to $ 580 million. .
On February 24, when Russian President Vladimir Putin announced that he would launch a military operation against Ukraine, it is reported that Volozh lost more than $400 million.