Page:2020-07-29 PSI Staff Report - The Art Industry and U.S. Policies that Undermine Sanctions.pdf/32

 Crimean Peninsula to the Russian mainland. In May 2018, the 12-mile bridge opened for traffic at a final cost of $3.7 billion. According to news reports, the bridge opened six months ahead of schedule. The bridge reportedly can "carry up to 40,000 cars per day [and] its span is greater than that of Vasco da Gama in Portugal, previously the longest in Europe." President Putin was on site to open the bridge to traffic.

In September 2019, a news article stated that Gazprom had purchased 100 percent of SGM for 70 billion to 95 billion rubles, the equivalent of $1.1 billion to $1.5 billion.

Forbes has estimated that Arkady Rotenberg is worth $2.8 billion.

'''ii. Boris Rotenberg'''

Boris Rotenberg is also a childhood friend of Vladimir Putin. Along with his brother Arkady, Boris Rotenberg and Putin have "sparred and trained in the same gym since they were teenagers in the 1960s." Their former judo coach, Anatoly Rakhin, commented on the friendship between the brothers and Putin saying, "[Putin] didn't take the Petersburg boys to work with him because of their pretty eyes, but because he trusts people who are tried and true." In 2001, Boris and Arkady Rotenberg founded SMP Bank. The brothers then used the bank to acquire interests in important industries such as construction, gas, and gas pipelines. By the mid-2000s, these acquisitions allowed them to become one of Russia's "main suppliers of large-diameter gas pipes."