The story
Founded by Gazprom in 1990, in Moscow.1
The Commercial Bank of the Gas Industry “Gazprombank” was established on July 31, 1990. In August 1996, its organizational and legal form was changed to a limited liability company; on November 13, 2001, the bank became a closed joint-stock company under the name “Joint-Stock Commercial Bank of the Gas Industry ‘Gazprombank’”; from August 31, 2007, it operated as an open joint-stock company under the same name, and since December 2014 it has operated as a joint-stock company “Gazprombank.”
In August 2005 for 37.22 billion rubles, Gazprombank purchased Gazprom Media, the largest Russian media holding, which includes the former Media Most holdings of Vladimir Gusinsky including the Sem Days publishing house, Echo of Moscow, both the NTV channel and NTV Plus, and Izvestia newspaper, from the bank's parent company Gazprom. After Gazprom-Media took over "Media Most" in 2000, Gazprom-Media received Filipp Bobkov's entire former KGB 5th directorate (Political police) which was responsible for disinformation, control of dissidents, and executions including all of its employees, its database and the Filipp Bobkov founded security service that was accused of attempting an assassination in 1994 of Boris Berezovsky. The entire archive of 5th KGB Main Directorate was taken to Media-Most.
In 2012, OJSC Gazprom owned a 41.73% stake in Gazprombank and NPF Gazfond owned a 46.92% stake in Gazprom. Most of the stake in Yuri Shamalov's Gazfond is managed by Anatoly Gavrilenko's Lider Management which is part of the SOGAZ insurance group which, until March 2014, was controlled by the Vladimir Putin associated Rossiya Bank which has Yuri Kovalchuk as its largest shareholder. In March 2014 Rossiya bank sold its indirect control of Lider to Gasfond which has a 45% stake in Lider. As of November 2014, Gazfond is the largest shareholder of Gazprombank which controls Gazprom Media.
The bank was nominated in 2014 for the annual Emerging Market Bond Awards, hosted by EuroWeek.
In August 2022, the state capitalized Gazprombank by 50 billion rubles at the expense of the Russian National Wealth Fund. The authorized capital of the bank increased to 246.85 billion rubles. Now the state owns a share of 36.44%.
In September 2023, Gazprombank bought the MEGA shopping centre chain from IKEA. The chain consisted of 14 centres in various regions of Russia with a total area of 2.3 million sq.m.
Since 2003, the company has been developing under the leadership of Andrey Igorevich Akimov.
Sanctions
In July 2014, the United States Department of the Treasury imposed sanctions on Gazprombank OAO that prohibit U.S. citizens from providing it with new financing. In response, Gazprombank contracted former U.S. Senator Trent Lott to lobby on its behalf against the sanctions.
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On February 24, 2022, US President Joe Biden announced sanctions against Gazprombank and other Russian financial institutions in response to Russia's invasion of Ukraine.
In March 2022, UK imposed sanctions on Gazprombank, which means that the bank is subject to asset freezes which locks it out of any resources held in Britain and prevents British firms from doing business with it.
On 25 January 2023, the US correspondent banks of Gazprombank advised that they were terminating their accounts, meaning that Gazprombank can no longer make transfers in US dollars.
On November 21, 2024 the US imposed sanctions on Gazprombank preventing the bank from handling any new energy-related transactions that touch the US Financial system, trading with any US persons or entities and freezing its US Assets. Gazprombank was previously the last major unsanctioned Russian bank to allow European countries to pay Russia for critical energy supplies.
Mortality in the leadership team (2022)
On January 29, 2022, Leonid Shulman, the head of the Gazprom-invest transport service, was found dead.
On February 25, 2022, Alexander Tyulyakov, Deputy General Director of the Unified Settlement Center of Gazprom, was found dead in a noose.
On March 2, 2022, Igor Volobuev, Vice President of Gazprombank, fled Russia to move to his native Ukraine, having been born in Okhtyrka, Sumy. He has also joined the Ukrainian territorial defense in an effort to 'wash off' his Russian past.
On April 18, 2022, former Gazprombank vice-president, Vladislav Avayev, was found dead from gunshot wounds in his Moscow apartment, along with his wife and daughter, in an apparent murder-suicide. Volobuev considers the death of Vladislav Avayev an assassination.
On 12 January 2023, Russia issued an arrest warrant for the former vice president of Gazprombank, Igor Volobuev, for being a "foreign agent". In early 2022, he returned to Ukraine and joined the Ukrainian backed Freedom of Russia Legion, having since received decorations for valour in combat
From Wikipedia’s article on Gazprombank, shared under CC BY-SA 4.0.4