Avito станет наполовину государственным

[Фото: Mikhail Grebenshchikov / RBC / TASS]

Former Megafon director, billionaire founder of Kismet Capital Group Ivan Tavrin sold 50% of shares in Avito, one of the largest classifieds platforms in the RuNet, to an unnamed structure of Rosselkhozbank, 100% of whose shares belong to the Russian government. This was reported by RBC, citing sources familiar with the deal.

According to one of the sources, the deal "was commercial", but it involved "elements of the credit funds that Kismet used when buying the company in 2022". At that time, Tavrin's company acquired 100% of Avito shares from the South African media holding Naspers, which owned the service since 2015 (the deal amounted to 151 billion rubles or $2.4 billion). There are no plans to change the marketplace's management, and one of Avito's goals after the deal is to prepare for "expansion in international markets and an IPO". "The bank is a financial partner," the RBC source notes. He added that Tavrin intends to ensure that " the spirit and culture of the company do not change with the arrival of the second shareholder." 

Avito, with an estimated value of  $4.6 billion and a monthly audience of 70 million users, is in fourth place in the Forbes rating of the most expensive Runet companies. Before Russia's aggression in Ukraine, Avito belonged to a division of Naspers, Naspers's Prosus. In October 2022, the asset was bought out by Tavrin's investment holding Kismet Capital Group. 

According to Naspers documents, the service's revenue for the 2022 financial year amounted to 48 billion rubles (55% higher than the previous year). After the purchase of Avito by Kismet, the revenue of the platform's main legal entity, Keh Ekommerts LLC, exceeded 100 billion rubles for 2023.  

In December 2023, Tavrin was included in the US sanctions list. In June 2024, he was blacklisted by the UK. Previously,  the entrepreneur headed the Megafon company, owned by billionaire Alisher Usmanov. 

Rosselkhozbank is controlled by the Federal Property Management Agency and is engaged in lending to companies in the agro-industrial complex (AIC). It is the sixth largest bank in Russia by assets (RUB 5.53 trillion as of March 1). The bank has been subject to sectoral sanctions by the United States and is also disconnected from the SWIFT system.