Ruben Vardanyan (politician)

Ruben Karleni Vardanyan (Ռուբեն Կառլենի Վարդանյան, Рубен Карленович Варданян; born 25 May 1968) is a Russian-Armenian oligarch, former adviser to Vladimir Putin, and a politician who served as the State Minister of Artsakh (Nagorno-Karabakh), an unrecognized state in the South Caucasus, from 4 November 2022 until 23 February 2023.

Vardanyan continued to work in Artsakh following his dismissal from the post of State Minister.

Prior to his political career, Vardanyan was a businessman and philanthropist.

He is the former chief executive officer and shareholder of the Troika Dialog investment bank, which was the hearth of the Troika Laundromat.

On 27 September 2023, Vardanian's wife Veronika Zonabend told Russian media outlet Kommersant that she had "lost contact" with him following the 2023 Nagorno-Karabakh clashes; on the same day, he was detained by the Azerbaijani State Border Service in the Lachin corridor while attempting to cross into Goris, Armenia.

On 28 September 2023, he was charged by Azerbaijani authorities with "financing terrorism, creating illegal armed formations and illegally crossing a state border".

In 2021, his net worth was estimated by Forbes at $1 billion.

Ruben Vardanyan was born on 25 May 1968, in Yerevan, Armenian SSR.

In 1985 he graduated with honours from Yerevan School No. 35.

In 1985, he enrolled in Moscow State University's Faculty of Economics.

After completing his first year, he did military service in Soviet Azerbaijan and Armenia.

Vardanyan and Peter Derby founded Troika Dialog on 18 March 1991.

Vardanyan first worked as an expert and then headed the IPO department.

In 1992 he graduated with honours from the Faculty of Economics.

Vardanyan was trained at Cassa di Risparmio di Torino Italian savings bank in Turin and completed a course on developing markets at Merrill Lynch in New York in 1992.

In 1992, Vardanyan entered the executive board and became an executive director.

Later he became the president, CEO, and chairman of the board of directors of the company.

He held the post until the company was sold.

Later, he completed short-term courses at INSEAD (Fontainebleau, France, 2000), Harvard Business School (2001, 2005, 2018), Yale University and Stanford GSB (2012, 2013).

In the early 2000s, Troika had offices in New York and London.

At financial year-end 2010, Troika’s assets totaled $5.75 bln, $872 mln equity and $42.346 mln revenue.

As of 2011, the partners held 63.6% of Troika Dialog shares, with 40% owned by Vardanyan.

On March 11, 2011, Sberbank announced its 100% acquisition of Troika Dialog for $1 bln, the transaction was finalized on January 23, 2012.

The agreement also included Troika's partners’ bonuses for three years, thus the overall deal totaled $1.4 bln.

Before the sale, Vardanyan owned the major block of shares (40%), estimated at $560 mln.

In requital, he was offered a 20.5% stake in AvtoVAZ and a 27.3% stake in Kamaz, later sold with a profit.

The merger resulted in the launch of Sberbank CIB, Sberbank’s corporate and investment banking business.

By 2013, Forbes estimated Vardanyan's net worth at $800 mln.

In 2013 Vardanyan along with Mikhail Broitman started Vardanyan, Broitman and Co, an investment company.

In 2013 Vardanyan acquired a 50% share in Avica Management Company, an investment fund, established by Gagik Adibekyan's RD Group.

From the sale of "Troika Dialog" until 2015, Vardanyan co-headed Sberbank CIB, also holding posts of adviser to the CEO of Sberbank and chairman of the board.

In 2015 Ruben Vardanyan launched "Phoenix Advisors", a company engaged in family welfare protection, management and succession planning.

Citing Santerna's publicly available annual reports, the investigation found that, in 2016, Santerna invested almost $33.45 million in Luchano, a spa business owned by Gulsina Minnikhanova, the wife of the President of Tatarstan Rustam Minnikhanov.

As of 2018, Vardanyan owned 75% of the company.

Its assets include shares in Ameriabank, UFS Transport operator, and several venture projects (Lamoda, Pronutria, NtechLab).

Major investments are placed in real estate management.

In February 2018 the partners announced a split, dividing real estate assets of estimated $1 bln value.

Accprding to the settlement, Vardanyan was to keep office spaces, including Romanov Dvor and Vozdvizhenka business centres.

Also in 2018 Vardanyan and Global Blue announced the launch of Global Blue Russia, a first tax-refunding company in Russia.

In 2020, the Anti-Corruption Foundation, a Russian NGO led by Russian opposition figure Alexey Navalny, published an investigation which concerned Santerna Holdings Limited, a company owned by Vardanyan.