‘So Clearly Bright’

If a court takes Bouvier’s view that the two men were on equal footing as art experts, the documents could support the view that Rybolovlev should have known what prices were fair. “How could a Russian who’s become a billionaire, achieved all he did, and is so clearly bright, be taken advantage of by me?” Bouvier said in an interview last year.

For a look at how the Bouvier-Rybolovlev relationship unraveled, click here.

Asked for comments on the documents, Ron Soffer, the Paris-based attorney for Mr. Bouvier, said Rybolovlev directed the acquisition of one of the most important private art collections in modern times. “He certainly could not have been a novice in the field and this document confirms it,” Soffer said.

Rybolovlev alleges that Bouvier gave the impression he was securing a work for a certain price on his client’s behalf, but in reality was buying it for sometimes tens of millions less and pocketing the difference. Contributing to the impression that the men were acting as buyer and agent, Bouvier charged a 2 percent “commission” on most transactions, the lawyer said.

Bouvier and his lawyers have said he wasn’t a broker, adding that 80 percent of the bills he issued to Rybolovlev’s companies listed him as the seller. The 2 percent charges, they say, didn’t represent a broker’s commission but were instead a fee to cover administrative costs, including insurance, transport and condition reports and, in some cases, escrow accounts between down payment and final payment.

The battle -- which has made global headlines because of the prices the Russian paid for single canvases like the 140 million euros ($158 million) he spent on Rothko’s “No. 6 (Violet, Green and Red)” -- has highlighted the lack of transparency surrounding major art deals. It’s also one of several recent instances in which art-world luminaries have come under international scrutiny, U.S. authorities -- who are looking into transactions involving Bouvier, people familiar with the probe have said -- are also investigating whether several major collectors have paid proper taxes there on big art transactions.

Global art sales have cooled after years of booms, falling seven percent last year to $63.8 billion, but were still up by more than 60 percent from 2009.

Fertilizer Fortune

Rybolovlev amassed his wealth buying and selling fertilizer makers in Russia’s wild transition to capitalism. That fortune, which includes his ownership of the soccer team in Monaco, makes him the the 10th-richest Russian, worth an estimated $9.3 billion according to Bloomberg.

Bouvier was briefly arrested in Monaco in February 2015 in connection with the original criminal complaint Rybolovlev filed against him there in the matter. Monaco prosecutors in November refused Bouvier’s request to drop their investigation into the complaint. The two are also battling in Singapore, where in March 2015 Rybolovlev temporarily secured a freeze of up to $500 million of Bouvier’s global assets. That action, in a so-called Mareva injunction, was set aside in August.

Now, in an effort to gain a friendlier hearing, Bouvier’s attorneys earlier this month filed for permission to appeal a Singapore judge’s ruling to move the dispute to the city-state’s International Commercial Court. The case, Bouvier’s lawyers argue, should instead be heard in Switzerland, given the purchase of the 37 works took place primarily in the European country, where Bouvier lived until leaving for Singapore in 2009. Rybolovlev resided in Geneva until 2011, before he decamped to Monaco.

A spokesman for Rybolovlev declined to comment on the merits of the venues or on the Singapore proceedings, citing restrictions on communications imposed by the judge there.

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