Sanctions against Eugene Tenenbaum and David Davidovich raise the total number of oligarchs, family members and associates with ties to Russia to 106 on the UK list, the government announced on Thursday. According to the government, company records show that Tenenbaum, a manager at Chelsea, took control of Ervington Investments, an investment vehicle linked to Abramovich, on February 24, the day Vladimir Putin sent troops to Ukraine. Davidovich then took over Ervington Investments from Tenenbaum last month, the government said, adding that Davidovich was facing a travel ban as well as a freeze on assets. The UK Foreign Secretary, Liz Truss, described the move as “the largest asset-free operation in the history of the UK”. The scale of the freeze shows exactly how much of Abramovich’s fortune has been invested in the United Kingdom, whose capital has been dubbed “Londongrad” because it embraced Russian oligarchs in the early 2000s. The 10 10 billion frozen in the UK is higher than many top estimates for the Russian oligarch’s total net worth, with Forbes estimating it at $ 8.2 billion. The new round of sanctions comes a day after a court in the Channel Islands of Jersey ordered the seizure of more than $ 7 billion worth of assets linked to Abramovich. The UK government has said it has coordinated its action with the Jersey authorities. “We are tightening the noose on Putin’s war machine and targeting the circle of people closest to the Kremlin,” Tras said. “We will continue with sanctions until Putin fails in Ukraine. “Nothing and no one is off the table.” Chelsea declined to comment following a request from the Financial Times to Tenenbaum through the club. Could not contact Davidovich for comment. The two are among Abramovich’s longest-serving lieutenants, having both worked for Sibneft, the oil company the oligarch sold to the Russian state in 2005 in a $ 13 billion deal that consolidated his fortune. Tenenbaum has been on Chelsea’s board since 2003, when Abramovich bought the Premier League club he now sells. A biography on the Chelsea website describes Tenenbaum as one of Abramovich’s “closest associates”. The Tenenbaum sanctions come on the same day that bidders vying to buy Chelsea are set to submit their revised bids, with a number of North American billionaires competing for an Abramovich club funded over the past two decades. London Stock Exchange records last month revealed that Abramovich had transferred entities holding investments in UK-listed companies to both Davidovich and Tenenbaum after the invasion of Ukraine. Davidovich now controls Norma Investments in the British Virgin Islands, one of the oligarch’s main investment vehicles – whose name is Roman anagram. He eventually owned one of his super yachts as well as shares in British companies. The UK corporate records state that Davidovich resides in Israel and Tenenbaum in Jersey.
