Alexander Ponomarenko

Alexander Ponomarenko was born on October 27, 1964 in Crimea, Belogorsk City, Ukrainian SSR.[2]

He earned a bachelor's degree from Simferopol State University, followed by a master's from Russian State Academy of Management.[1]

From 1983 to 1985, Ponomarenko served in airborne divisions of the armed forces.[3] By the end of the 1980s, he was the junior boxing champion of Ukraine.[4]

Ponomarenko has worked for much of his career with fellow billionaire Alexander Skorobogatko. In the late 1980s, Ponomarenko, together with Skorobogatko, founded an enterprise in the Crimea that specialised in perfume products and building materials.

The two business partners later moved to Moscow and founded the Russian General Bank in 1996. In 2006, according to Vedomosti, the bank was sold to Hungarian OTP Bank for $477 million.[5]

Following the financial crisis in 1998, the partners started buying up shares in cargo companies that eventually combined to form Novorossiysk Commercial Sea Port (NCSP), which became the largest seaport in Russia.

In 2004, Ponomarenko was appointed the Chairman of NCSP. In 2007, NCSP had its initial public offering, listing 19.3% of total equity on the London Stock Exchange for US$955 million. At the beginning of 2011, the majority stake of NCSP was sold to Summa Capital and Transneft for US$2.5 billion.[6]

The trust acting in the interests of the families of Ponomarenko and Skorobogatko invested a significant part of the funds from the sale of NCSP to form the TPS Real Estate company to invest in the construction and operation of shopping and entertainment complexes. Among the main assets of this company are TRK Gallery Krasnodar, Gallery Novosibirsk, Moremoll in Sochi, Ocean Plaza in Kiev, and Oceania and Khorosho malls in Moscow.

In 2013, the above trust acting in the interests of the families of Ponomarenko and Skorobogatko established TPS Avia Holding to invest in infrastructure development at Moscow's Sheremetyevo International Airport. In 2013, the company won a bid to develop a new cargo terminal at the airport.[7] Ponomarenko joined the Board of Directors of JSC Sheremetyevo International Airport in 2015 and was elected its Chairman in 2016.[8]

In 2016, TPS Avia secured 68% stake in Sheremetyevo Airport and committed to investing US$840 million to upgrade and expand the airport's infrastructure.[9]

In September 2020, Ponomarenko was named to Kommersant’s list of the top business leaders in Russia. He was among 46 business leaders within a list of the country’s top 1,000 managers chosen by a committee of experts from the Russian Managers Association.[10]

Ponomarenko previously made the list in 2019.[11] He ranked 31st on the Forbes list of "200 Richest Businessmen in Russia" in 2020.[12]

Ponomarenko is married, with three children and lives in Moscow.[1]

In 2011, Ponomarenko purchased a "palace allegedly constructed for the private benefit of Russian president Vladimir Putin", now known as Putin's Palace.[13] At the time of the purchase, Ponomarenko indicated that he had purchased the palace as an investment and planned to finish building the palace as a hotel complex.[14] He said he bought if for a low price because of the scandal surrounding it and that the value of the complex could rise to as much as $350 million when the project was complete.[15] Ponomarenko's media representatives told Forbes in 2021 that Ponomarenko had withdrawn from the project in 2016.[16]

In 2017, it was reported in The Guardian that Ponomarenko had acquired Cypriot citizenship in 2016 through a "Golden visa" scheme.[13]