Suleiman Kerimov - from Polytechnic to the "city for millionaires

The hero of the column "People and Facts" is Suleiman Kerimov, who according to the rating of millionaires of Russia 2009 is the 5th in this elite list. Being a kettlebell champion, chairman of the trade union committee, an ordinary economist, a director and a deputy, Kerimov is building the "City for Millionaires".

Suleiman Abusaidovich Kerimov was born on March 12, 1966 in Derbent, Dagestan, in the family of a lawyer and an accountant. He was the youngest child, his brother was a doctor by profession and his sister was a teacher.

In 1983, Kerimov graduated from high school with a gold medal and entered the construction department of the Dagestan Polytechnic Institute. After his first year, he was drafted into the army, where he served from 1984 to 1986 in the Strategic Missile Forces to the rank of staff sergeant and was chief of calculation of the Strategic Missile Forces.

After serving in the army, Suleiman Kerimov continued his studies, but with a different specialty - economist in the Dagestan State University (DSU). During his studies he was deputy chairman of the trade union committee. Three years later, he graduated with an economics degree and, not without the patronage of his high-ranking father-in-law, joined the Eltav factory as a rank-and-file economist. By the end of his work at the plant, by 1993, Kerimov was already serving as assistant to the general director for economic affairs.

On December 7, 2003, Kerimov was elected as a deputy to the fourth State Duma of the fourth convocation on the federal list from the LDPR. In the Duma he was appointed deputy chairman of the State Duma Committee on Physical Culture and Sports and was also included in the security committee.

Kerimov now

Suleiman Kerimov currently owns by Nafta-MoscowThe company's portfolio is estimated at 6 percent in Sberbank and 4 percent in Gazprom. In the portfolio of this company, according to its own estimates, more than 6 percent of Sberbank, and more than 4 percent of Gazprom, cable television operators in Moscow and St. Petersburg - "Mosteleset" and "National Cable Networks", as well as a private town "Rublevo-Arkhangelskoe2, which occupies 430 hectares of land in the suburbs.

Not surprisingly, the main source of Kerimov's capital is asset buyback. Nafta has not a single large company in its assets. For example, in 2000 Kerimov's company bought Varieganneftegaz. In 2001, Kerimov added to his "collection" of shares of Andrey Andreyev's auto insurance business, which consisted of more than a hundred companies, such as Avtobank (now part of Uralsib Corporation), Ingosstrakh, IC Ingosstrakh-Russia (now Russia), "), Nosta, Ingosstrakh-Soyuz Bank (now Soyuz) and others. Nafta was also actively involved in oil trading until 2002, being one of the biggest players in Russia.

However, the raw materials market did not cease to interest Kerimov, and in late 2005 Nafta acquired Russia's second gold mining company, Polymetal, for $900 million, after which it floated about 25% of its shares on the stock exchange.

The next step was Kerimov's turn to investments, so in February 2006 he decided to turn Nafta-Moscow into a full-fledged investment company, turning it into a leading private equity fund.

Among other things, Kerimov invested in real estate, in particular, invested about $ 3 billion in the construction of 2.7 million square meters of luxury housing in "Rublevo Archangelsk", which got its name "A City for Millionaires.". According to the organizers' plans, the city will be inhabited by 30 thousand of the country's richest people, with the city area of 430 hectares. The most common housing will be 3-bedroom apartments, with an area of 150 sq.m., "budget" one-bedroom apartments are quite rare, but 5-bedroom penthouses are planned.

In the spring of 2008, Kerimov decided to part with the project by selling it to Mikhail Shishkhanov, the president of Bin-Bank. Sberbank issued a loan for the purchase secured by the land and 10% of the profits from the complex. At the moment the construction has been suspended and the value of the land plot where the project is being implemented has dropped by half. The crisis...

We have not given all the facts of our hero's life and business history, but one thing about Suleiman Kerimov we can say for sure, developing a career ladder has helped him develop an investment mindset that helps him clearly identify where to invest in order to get good returns.

Biographical information is taken from public sources.