A 77-meter apartment and more than half a million euros: the declared assets of Vladimir Putin

Vladimir Putin prefers to keep money in the bank than to invest in brick.

According to the Central Electoral Commission of Russia, the president has, after having led a nuclear power for a quarter of a century, more than half a million euros in his accounts, a 77 square meter apartment with a garage in Saint Petersburg and three modest cars.

Exactly the same assets that he declared ahead of the 2018 elections, although with only one difference: the Russian president has officially saved more than 400,000 euros in the last six years.

Putin's declaration of assets includes a 77-square-meter apartment in his hometown, St. Petersburg, with an 18-square-meter garage space.

The powerful Russian leader also owns three vehicles: two classic Soviet cars, Gaz M21 - popularly known as

Volga -

from 1960 and 1965, and a Lada Niva from 2009. Putin also owns a

Skif

-

Scythian

, in Russian - trailer.

1987.

The Russian electoral board assures that Putin has earned 67.5 million rubles between 2017 and 2023, almost 700,000 euros at the current poor exchange rate.

That is, about 940,000 rubles per month, 9,600 euros per month and 115,000 euros per year at the exchange rate.

As a comparison, the President of the Spanish Government, Pedro Sánchez, earns 90,010 euros annually, while the American leader, Joe Biden, earns 400,000 dollars (369,000 euros).

According to electoral commission figures, Putin prefers to keep most of his money in the bank, although he does not specify whether he has invested it, thus taking advantage of the huge rise in interest rates caused by his invasion of Ukraine.

The Russian president's savings have risen from 13.8 million rubles in 2016 – the year before the previous elections – to 54.4 million rubles in 2023. However, the Russian economic crisis is also reflected in the president's piggy bank. , which has multiplied by four in six years in nominal terms (less if seen in parity with other currencies: from almost 200,000 euros at the 2017 exchange rate to 570,000 euros today).

The president also has a modest investment in the stock market in his pocket, 230 shares of the Bank of Saint Petersburg, each of them with a nominal value of 11.8 rubles, ten euro cents.

Beyond his estate, he has another property in use in Moscow of 153 square meters, belonging to the Moscow City Council.

“We must keep in mind that the position of president of the Russian Federation presupposes having state support, which allows us to save money,” the press officer for Putin's electoral campaign, Alexandra Suvorova, explained to the newspaper Kommersant.

In fact, the president has several official residences at his disposal, among which his usual home stands out, located in Novo-Ogaryevo, on the outskirts of Moscow;

the historical Kremlin;

and the Bocharov Ruchey summer palace, located in the spa city of Sochi.

Added to these are other luxury properties for his official trips to cities such as Valdai and Kaliningrad, although the opposition suspects that the president's real assets are immensely greater: the investigation team of Alexei Navalni, declared extremist by the Russian authorities, accused the Russian leader to have a huge palace on the shores of the Black Sea in the name of businessmen friends.

The Kremlin denied these reports.

The Russian electoral board has published Putin's assets a day before the deadline to register as a candidate for the Russian presidential elections.

The elections will last three days, from March 14 to 17, and will include for the first time the controversial Internet voting, which has been criticized by the opposition and some members of the parties that remain legal as a tool to manipulate the elections.

Putin has once again presented himself as an independent candidate, although he has the support of the country's largest party, United Russia, behind him.

The general secretary of the formation, Andréi Turchak, stated this Tuesday that his volunteers have collected three and a half million signatures in his favor.

Opposite he will hardly have any opposition: the Communist Party, the second largest in the nation, has once again presented Nikolai Kharitonov, who at 75 years old will try to overcome the very poor 13% he obtained when he presented himself two decades ago, in 2004.

For its part, the hope on the part of the opposition now lies in a politician who is regular in the Kremlin's propaganda channels, Boris Nadezhdin.

Former deputy and former ally of the dissident Boris Nemtsov, murdered in 2015 in front of the Kremlin, he has become one of the few critical voices on Russian television against the war in Ukraine.

However, another part of the Russian dissident distrusts his candidacy and believes that it is a Kremlin strategy to legitimize Putin's victory: Nadezhdin participated years ago in the political platform of one of Putin's main advisors today, Sergei Kirienko. .

This Wednesday it will be known whether or not the electoral commission accepts his candidacy.

The dissident's other hope, journalist Yekaterina Duntsova, was vetoed by the electoral board in December.

Later, in mid-January, she was taken to the police station for a drug test a few hours after announcing that she was preparing to form a party.

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