Mike Bass, a spokesman for the NBA, said the league hasn’t received a proposal from Prokhorov to change the team’s ownership structure.
“The Nets are owned by Mikhail Prokhorov through a U.S.- based company,” Bass wrote in an e-mail. “We have received no application, nor is there a process under way through our office to transfer the ownership of the Nets to another company.”
The world’s leading industrial powers threatened further sanctions against Russia yesterday and said they’d boycott what was to be a Group of Eight summit hosted by Putin.
Kremlin Loyalty
Investors pulled $5.5 billion from Russian equities and bonds this year through March 20, according to data compiled by EPFR Global, a Cambridge, Massachusetts-based firm tracking fund flows. The outflow was $6.1 billion in all of 2013.
Prokhorov bought 80 percent of the Nets and a 45 percent stake in the Barclays Center in Brooklyn from developer Bruce Ratner for $200 million in 2010.
After losing 20 of their first 30 games to start the season, the Nets have improved of late. They’ve won four of their last five games to lift their record to 37-32, losing yesterday in overtime.
“Prokhorov is known for being loyal to the Kremlin while the Kremlin is loyal to him,” said Ivan Manaenko, head of research at Veles Capital in Moscow. “His move is politically motivated” and the “question of more sanctions is rather when than an if.”