(Bloomberg) -- Sanctioned Russian billionaire Andrey Guryev won his court fight with an old friend who claimed he broke a promise — sealed over beers at a London pub — to share his stake in one of the world’s largest fertilizer producers.
Guryev successfully defeated Alexander Gorbachev, who claimed he was owed almost a quarter of the tycoon’s shares in PhosAgro PJSC, at a trial that raked over allegations of business deals struck after the fall of the Soviet Union.
Gorbachev invoked decades-old conversations held on the roadside outside London’s pubs and hotels to bolster his claim during the six-week trial. But his allegations were dismissed by Judge Mark Pelling, who said “there are simply too many unexplained and unexplainable inconsistencies and inherent implausibilities.”
The ruling caps a bitterly contested dispute that’s run for years. A significant chunk of Guryev’s wealth comes from his 48% holding in the fertilizer producer controlled through two firms and his wife. The chemicals giant had an enterprise value of over $11 billion in 2023.
“This is an extremely disappointing decision,” Gorbachev said after the ruling. “Clearly, I will review it and consider my options.”
Guryev said in a statement he’s “satisfied by the dismissal of Gorbachev’s unmeritorious claims” and that he’s “grateful to the trial judge for his hard work in getting to grips with the real truth.”
Guryev was first sanctioned in 2022 by the UK, which sees him as one of the men Russian President Vladimir Putin uses to prop up Russia’s “war economy.” He is worth $10.5 billion, according to the Bloomberg Billionaires Index.
The former friends first met when they were both members of the Moscow branch of the youth wing of the Communist Party. Gorbachev’s lawyers said they built the fertilizer giant grabbing one asset after another in the chaotic privatization era following the collapse of the Soviet Union.
‘Clinked Our Pints’
The pair were “blazing a trail in the unexplored wilderness of Russian capitalism,” Gorbachev’s lawyers said.
They built the business empire in risky and dangerous ways that are “a million miles from the sort of organized business planning that is discussed in MBA seminars,” they said.
The trial homed in on moments such as in 2005, where the two men sat on a kerb outside a pub after a sauna and “clinked our pints” to seal a promise, Gorbachev said, recalling the conversation in his witness statement. He alleged that Guryev told him: “I will hold your 25% of the fertilizer business for you under my name. You shouldn’t worry about anything.”
Guryev denied there were ever any such agreements, and called Gorbachev’s claim an elaborate shakedown. Gorbachev cashed out his 5% options in 2007 for $20 million and now has “no legal entitlement to anything,” Guryev’s lawyers said.
Guryev purchased Witanhurst, a mansion in north London’s Highgate area that’s the city’s largest private home, in 2008. He did so using the duo’s joint pool of money, Gorbachev’s lawyers said. The 65 room mansion was then priced as high as £150 million, according to legal filings.
The relationship broke down following a visit to the mansion, Guryev said. “After that, Gorbachev no longer existed for me. There was no point discussing him because my blood was boiling from a sense of antipathy.”
(Updates with details on the alleged conversations between the businessmen in 11th paragraph.)
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