Italian police have seized the yacht of Alexey Mordasov, Russia's richest man, who was sanctioned by the European Union this week following Russia's invasion of Ukraine.
"Lady M" is 65 meters long and located in the port of Imperia, in northern Italy.
According to Italian media, Lady M was built in 2013 by the American company Palmer Johnson. Forbes magazine estimates that its value reaches 27 million dollars.
Mordasov also owns a villa worth about 66 million euros in Sardinia. It has not been clarified at this time whether this property was confiscated by the Italian authorities.
Born in 1965, Alexey Alexandrovich is a Russian billionaire businessman and the main shareholder and chairman of Severstal, a Russian conglomerate with interests in metal, energy and mining companies.
As of March 2022, Bloomberg Billionaires Index estimated Mordashov's personal net worth at US$21.2 billion, making him the second-richest person in Russia, however, the Forbes ranking takes into account the assets of the whole family, ranking Mordashov first among Russian billionaires ($29.1B).
With the E.U.'s latest list of sanctions targeting specific Russian oligarchs released on Monday, some appear to be finding creative ways to hold onto their wealth, Mordashov included.
In a recent public filing submitted to the U.K. government on Wednesday, Russian mining company Nordgold revealed that majority owner Mordashov had secretly transferred his entire stake in Nordgold, around $1.1 billion, to his wife, Marina Mordashova, in an effort to divest himself of assets vulnerable to the E.U. sanctions.
Another luxury boat belonging to Gennady Timchenko, the billionaire who has close ties to Russian President Vladimir Putin, is also stranded in Imperia and will be seized soon, said a source.
The move follows similar seizures in France and Germany this week of yachts belonging to other Russian oligarchs, as Western states implement massive sanctions, including asset freezes, to try to force Russia to withdraw from Ukraine.
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