President Vladimir Putin has signed a decree removing Sheremetyevo International Airport from the list of strategic enterprises, lifting the main legal barrier to the sale of the state's 30.43% stake. The document, published on August 6 and effective from the date of signing, was reported by RBC. The state's shares are managed by the Federal Agency for State Property Management (Rosimushchestvo).
The same decree instructs the government to apply a special right of state participation in the company's management — the so-called 'golden share' — which allows state representatives to block key decisions even after the state stake is sold.
The terms of the deal must include maintaining the airport's core business, modernizing its facilities, and a ban on transferring shares to foreign ownership or to persons controlled by foreigners. The decree does not specify the privatization timeline, the value of the stake, or a potential buyer.
Currently, the airport's main shareholder is Sheremetyevo Holding LLC, which owns 66.06%. The holding is fully owned by TPS Avi Holding, which has not disclosed its founders since its redomiciliation in 2022. Previously, it was known that 65.22% of the company was controlled by a trust of the families of Alexander Ponomarenko and Alexander Skorobogatko, and another 34.78% by Arkady Rotenberg. The remaining shares of Sheremetyevo belong to Aeroflot (2.43%) and the airport's management (1.05%).
In late January, a Sheremetyevo structure bought the nationalized Domodedovo airport. The company Perspektiva, co-owned by Arkady Rotenberg, purchased it for 66.1 billion rubles — half the auction's starting price. Until June 2025, Domodedovo belonged to Dmitry Kamenshchik, but a court, following a lawsuit by the Prosecutor General's Office, turned it over to the state due to the businessman's foreign citizenship.
In July 2026, it became known that Vnukovo would buy 25% of Perspektiva, which controls Domodedovo, from Sheremetyevo.