Alexander Lebedev

Alexander Yevgenievich Lebedev (Александр Евгеньевич Лебедев; born 16 December 1959) is a Russian businessman, and has been referred to as one of the Russian oligarchs.

In 1977, Lebedev entered the Department of Economics at Moscow State Institute of International Relations.

After he graduated in 1982, Lebedev began working at the Institute of Economics of the World Socialist System doing research for his Kandidat (between master's degree and doctorate) dissertation, The problems of debt and the challenges of globalization.

Lebedev transferred to the First Chief Directorate (Foreign Intelligence) of the KGB.

According to The Sunday Times, as a KGB spy, he was based at the Soviet embassy in London from 1988, bringing his son, Evgeny Lebedev, with him.

At the embassy, he worked on economic issues with Andrey Kostin who was also at the embassy until 1990.

Until 1992, he was an officer in the First Chief Directorate (Foreign Intelligence) of the Soviet Union′s KGB and later one of the KGB's successor-agencies, Russia's Foreign Intelligence Service (SVR).

He worked for the KGB's successor, the Foreign Intelligence Service, until 1992.

According to a report presented by the Italian External Intelligence and Security Agency to the parliamentary oversight committee (Copasir), Lebedev's resignation from the FSB might have been fictitious and he "continued to participate in annual KGB meetings".

Moreover, "He would have started his business activity while still in the service of the KGB and using the funds he had acquired as an agent", the report noted.

Upon leaving the Russian intelligence community, Lebedev set up his first company, the Russian Investment-Finance Company.

In 1995 this bought the National Reserve Bank, a small Russian bank which was in trouble at the time.

The bank subsequently grew rapidly to become one of Russia's largest banks.

Among the bank's assets were:

The bank is the core of the group of companies holding National Reserve Corporation, that according to Lebedev's personal site owns around US$2 billion of assets.

In March 2006, Forbes estimates Lebedev's fortune as high as US$3.5 billion, but as of July 2013 he dropped out of the billionaires list and is no longer a billionaire.

The National Reserve Corporation included the National Land Company (the biggest potato producer in Russia), National Housing Corporation (construction of affordable houses), National Mortgage Company (Национальная Ипотечная Компания), as well as interests in textiles, telecommunications, trams and trolleybuses, electrical power, chemical and tourist industries owning a large hotel network in Crimea and plan to create the National Reserve Park that would manage diverse tourist enterprises in Russia, Ukraine and France.

Lebedev used to own the Moskovski Korrespondent, but according to Channel 4's Dispatches programme, Lebedev closed it down for publishing an article about Vladimir Putin having an affair with Alina Kabayeva.

In early 2008, he was listed as the 39th richest Russian, and worth an estimated US$3.1 billion by Forbes magazine, but by October 2008 he was worth $300 million.

On 21 January 2009, Lebedev and his company Evening Press Corporation, part of Lebedev Holdings, bought approximately a 75.1% of share in the Evening Standard newspaper for £1.

The previous owners, the Daily Mail and General Trust, continue to hold 24.9% in the company in the new firm, named Evening Standard Ltd. Lebedev promised not to interfere with the editorial running of the paper.

Lebedev commented that during his time as a spy in London, he used the Evening Standard to find information.

Paul Dacre, the editor-in-chief of the Evening Standard at the time of the sale said: "It's a very sad day for the paper, it's a very sad day for the Rothermeres. We are very sorry that it leaked out, we had no control over that. Everyone's been working very hard and there's a lot of hope for the future of the Evening Standard."

In 2009, he entered into exclusive negotiations with Independent News & Media to buy the company's British national newspapers, The Independent and The Independent on Sunday.

Before the purchase was completed, his representatives offered the editorship of The Independent to Rod Liddle.

The offer was withdrawn after Liddle's putative appointment was opposed by the newspaper's staff and by an online campaign.

On 25 March 2010, Lebedev bought The Independent and Independent on Sunday for £1.

In March 2012, Forbes estimated his fortune at US$1.1 billion.

His fortune has since declined, and he is no longer considered to be a billionaire.

He is part owner of the Russian newspaper Novaya Gazeta and owner of two UK newspapers with his son Evgeny Lebedev: the Evening Standard and The Independent.

In May 2022, Lebedev was put on Canada's sanctions list following the 2022 Russian invasion of Ukraine.

He was separately reported to have met Vyacheslav Dukhin, a senior Russian government official, weeks before the invasion.

Lebedev was born in Moscow.

His parents were part of the Moscow intelligentsia.

His father, Yevgeny Nikolaevich Lebedev, was an elite athlete: a member of the Soviet national water polo team, and later a professor at the Bauman Moscow State Technical University, Moscow's highest technical school.

After graduating from Moscow Pedagogic Institute, Lebedev's mother, Maria Sergeyevna, worked in a rural Sakhalin school and later taught English in a Moscow tertiary school.

In 2012, National Reserve Bank (NRB) faced difficulties: corporate deposits decreased by 2.2 billion rubles, retail deposits by 1.2 billion rubles.

20% of the bank's liabilities had run off by the end of January 2012.

In March 2012, two top managers left the bank.

On 5 November 2012, Lebedev announced he would close all the regional offices of the National Reserve Bank and sell off the real estate as well as 75% of the bank's loan portfolio, worth 16.8 billion rubles (US$542 million).