Yuri Kovalchuk & family

About Me

Yuri Kovalchuk is friends with Russia's president Vladimir Putin; they met when Putin was deputy mayor of St. Petersburg. They both had country houses in the Ozero dacha cooperative, and when Putin became president, many of the cooperative's members' careers improved. Kovalchuck is now the largest shareholder of Rossiya Bank and has a large stake in Sogaz insurance company. He controls National Media Group, an investment firm with controlling stakes in popular Russian media assets. He was sanctioned by the U.S. and the EU in 2014, along with a group of close Putin friends. In December 2021 Sogaz bought 45% of MF Technologies, that controls VK, one of the largest internet companies in Russia.