A Russian oligarch who owns a lavish apartment in the same landmark Manhattan mansion as Disney boss Bob Iger rented out the unit just days before being sanctioned by the US government, The Post has learned.
Alexey Kuzmichev – co-founder of Moscow-based conglomerate Alfa Group, which has been accused of helping fund Vladimir Putin’s war on neighboring Ukraine – had bought four floors in the seven-story Atterbury Mansion at 33 E. 74th for $42.7 million in 2016.
Kuzmichev, 60, had tried to sell his 10,088 quadruplex for $41 million but could not find a buyer.
It was asking $70,000 a month as a rental in 2019. An American family rented the unit for an undisclosed price two years ago.
After their lease expired, they opted to renew it in early August, sources told The Post – before his assets were frozen on Aug. 11.
It was on that day that the US Treasury’s Office of Foreign Assets Control sanctioned Kuzmichev and the three other oligarchs – Mikhail Fridman, Petr Aven and German Khan – who founded Alfa Group following damning reports that subsidiary Alfa Bank was aiding Putin’s war machine.
The men say they are “apolitical” and denied close ties to Putin.
Kuzmichev’s 33-foot wide townhouse, built in 1901, is divided into just two apartments. Iger and his spouse, Willow Bay, Dean of USC’s Annenberg School of Communication and Journalism, bought the penthouse above Kuzmichev for $25.45 million in 2017, the Post exclusively reported.
The manse was designed by noted architect Grosvenor Atterbury and originally built for banker Julian Wainwright Robbins and his wife Sarah, a niece of Cornelius Vanderbilt.
Kuzmichev’s five-bedroom, five-bath and three powder-room residence contains the mansion’s original ballroom, with 20-foot-high ceilings. It now serves as the 30-by-50 foot living room.
Other lavish design details include original stained glass, wide white-oak planked floors and lots of marble.
A private and a public elevator service each floor. In addition, there’s a chef’s kitchen and a formal dining room that can seat 40 people. The parlor floor comes with 12-foot ceilings and floor-to-ceiling arched windows, and there is a large private terrace off the first floor.
Kuzmichev has also been a major benefactor on New York’s art scene. Together with his spouse, Svetlana Kuzmicheva-Uspenskaya, they were on the Chairman’s Council at the Metropolitan Museum of Art in 2021-2022.
The Met did not return calls about its relationship with the sanctioned oligarch — and whether or not it will give back Kuzmichev’s allegedly tainted donations.
The unregulated art market has been a useful way for oligarchs and criminals to launder money — and evade sanctions. In addition, toxic philanthropy is a way Russian oligarchs and other international kleptocrats launder their reputations, as well as their money, anti-corruption activists say.
Kuzmichev joined the Soviet military and the Communist Party of the Soviet Union as a young man in the late 1980s. He and his three Alfa-Bank co-founders all served on the supervisory board of the Alfa Group Consortium, which is one of the largest financial and investment conglomerates in Russia, according to the DOJ.
They have also been sanctioned by Australia, Canada, the European Union, New Zealand and the UK. They stepped down from the board but maintain financial stakes in Alfa Bank’s parent company.
“Wealthy Russian elites should disabuse themselves of the notion that they can operate business as usual while the Kremlin wages war against the Ukrainian people,” Deputy Treasury Secretary Wally Adeyemo said in a statement at the time.
“Our international coalition will continue to hold accountable those enabling the unjustified and unprovoked invasion of Ukraine,” Adeyemo added.
The European Union report on sanctioned individuals described Kuzmichev as “one of the most influential persons in Russia. He has well established ties to the Russian president.”
It went on to note that Putin’s eldest daughter, Maria, ran a charity project, Alfa-Endo, funded by Alfa Bank and that Putin “rewarded Alfa Group’s loyalty to the Russian authorities by providing political help to Alfa Group foreign investment plans.”
The EU report went on to note that Kuzmichev was “actively supporting materially or financially and benefiting from Russian decision-makers responsible for the annexation of Crimea or the destabilization of Ukraine. He is also a leading Russian business person involved in economic sectors providing a substantial source of revenue to the Government of the Russian Federation.”
French authorities seized his two mega yachts – La Petite Ourse and La Petite Ourse II, worth a combined $98 million – in the South of France last year.
He sued and one of the vessels was returned on grounds that ‘procedural errors’ were made during the seizure. French customs was ordered to pay Kuzmichev 10,000 euros in compensation. The other case is still pending.
The EU sanctions prevent Kuzmichev from taking the yacht out of French territorial waters. However, his lawyer, Philippe Blanchetier, noted: “Inside [of France[, he is allowed to move around, whether by foot, by horse, by car or by boat.”
Blanchetier did not return requests for comment at press time.
This story originally appeared on NYPost
