Investigation Reveals Bidzina Ivanishvili’s Family’s Large Real Estate Holdings in Moscow
An international journalistic investigation has revealed large real estate holdings of apartments and lands in Moscow owned by family members of the billionaire patron and founder of Georgia’s ruling party Bidzina Ivanishvili.
Although Ivanishvili promised in 2011, when he founded Georgian Dream, that he would sell his Russian companies and revoke his Russian passport, the investigation says otherwise.
The investigation was conducted jointly by the Organized Crime and Corruption Reporting Project (OCCRP), iStories, GMC, Studio Monitori, iFact, and Transparency International – Georgia.
The investigation revealed that Bidzina Ivanishvili’s family owns two private residences in two prestigious districts of Moscow, Sokol and Odintsovo, of 795.6 and 614.5 square meters, respectively, and adjacent to one of these residences, nine plots of land with a total area of 52,749 square meters, including three garages and nine additional buildings.
The reporters estimate the total value of the property to be at least USD 14.7 million.
The properties are officially registered to Ekaterine Khvedelidze and Uta Ivanishvili, Bidzina Ivanishvili’s wife and son, and to the Russian company Aqua Space, which Ivanishvili, according to the investigators, owns through the offshore company Vanity Overseas Limited, registered in the Virgin Islands.
Odintsovo Residence
Bidzina Ivanishvili’s family purchased land in Moscow’s Odintsovo district in 1997-1998. Until now, it was known that Ivanishvili’s wife, Ekaterine Khvedelidze, officially owned only three plots of land with a total area of 12,107 square meters in this district. This was included in Bidzina Ivanishvili’s 2013 declaration of assets, when he was Georgia’s Prime Minister.
However, the investigation revealed that since 2013, Ekaterine Khvedelidze has continued to acquire property around this land. In 2021, she acquired two adjacent plots of land with a total area of 9070 square meters, including several buildings on them, one of which is a private residence of 795 square meters; and just a few months ago, on April 19, 2024, she acquired another plot of land of 4500 square meters.
According to the investigation, the Odinstovo residence that Khvedelidze acquired in 2021 and the land she bought in 2024 were previously owned by Ucha Mamatsashvili, Bidzina Ivanishvili’s cousin with ties to U.S.-sanctioned Putin crony KGB General Georgy Poltavchenko.
In addition, the investigation also found that three additional adjacent plots of land around the Odintsovo residence are owned by Ivanishvili’s family through the Russian company “Aqua Space,” which itself is owned by Ivanishvili through Vanity Overseas Limited, an offshore company registered in the Virgin Islands.
In total, Ivanishvili’s family owns nine adjacent plots of land in the Odinstovo district, with a 795-square-meter residence, three garages, and nine other buildings. Their total value is estimated to be at least $11 million.
Sokol Residence
The investigation revealed that Ivanishvili’s family also owns and currently rents the residence in another prestigious district, Sokol, to the Russian film director Adrey Pershin (known as Zhora Kryzhovnikov) for approximately USD 9,000 per month.
This apartment, estimated to be worth at least USD 3.8 million, is owned by Ekaterine Khvedelidze and Uta Ivanishvili. Back in 2013, when Bidzina Ivanishvili was Georgian Prime Minister, this residence was included in his asset declaration.
The company “Aqua Space” is responsible for the maintenance and rental of the apartment. This company, which has a bank account in Russia’s Sberbank, transfers most of the money from the rent to Ekaterine Khvedelidze, who has an account in another Russian bank, VTB. Both banks are sanctioned by the United States.
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