Media Missteps
But there was no way to get away from the risks of Russian business. The prominent journalists he’d installed in 2013 to turn money-losing RBC around started probing themes the Kremlin had made taboo: multibillion-ruble projects involving one of Putin’s daughters, deaths of Russian military personnel in the war in Ukraine and the wealth of Putin’s close friends.
Kremlin officials repeatedly told Prokhorov and the editors that they were crossing the line, according to people familiar with the conversations. Pro-government protesters marched outside RBC’s offices, denouncing staff as foreign agents.
By late last year, Prokhorov had concluded that it was too difficult to keep track of the Kremlin’s ever-changing rules for oligarch behavior and that only businessmen from Putin’s inner circle could succeed in Russia, according to people close to him.
Last December, Prokhorov invited Anton Krasovsky, who had served as his spokesman in the 2012 campaign, to visit his mansion outside Moscow. Showing off his private gym, the billionaire talked enthusiastically about the Nets but was downbeat about prospects in Russia, Krasovsky recalled. “He had had enough and wanted to get out,” Krasovsky said.
Brooklyn Expansion
Prokhorov’s Nets investment, together with the Barclays Center, which he also owns, has more than doubled in value since he made it, despite the team’s losing record. In December, he bought full control of the team and the arena. This year, he led a group that took over leases on Brooklyn’s Paramount Theater and the Nassau Coliseum on Long Island. New York Mayor Bill de Blasio attended the opening of a new Nets training center in February, praising the team’s commitment to the city.
Offshore Accounts
In April, RBC published revelations about offshore accounts leaked from a Panama law firm. Putin wasn’t mentioned, a point the Kremlin hit hard in its public statements, but RBC illustrated a front-page story about the leaks with a photo of the president. A state-television news anchor held up the edition and blasted RBC as “assistants” of the U.S. secret services.
Four days later, as Putin was speaking in public about easing regulatory pressure on business, agents of the Federal Security Service, the main successor of the KGB, swept into the offices of Prokhorov’s companies in Moscow, seeking evidence in a tax-evasion case that predated his ownership. The Kremlin denied any political motivation, but the message was clear. Privately, Kremlin officials say Prokhorov had crossed the line too many times, even after he’d been warned.