Communicating with the reporters through his lawyer, Bergmair declined to specify which assets he is targeting, whether he had approached Lukoil directly, or if he was acting as part of a group of investors.
“Obviously Lukoil International GmbH would be a great investment, and anybody would be fortunate to have the privilege of owning those assets,” Reuters quoted the response.
“I don’t comment on potential investments as a matter of course.”
Interest in Lukoil’s overseas holdings surged after the U.S. Treasury granted the companies a license through Dec. 13 to negotiate an orderly sell-off. Vienna-based Lukoil International GmbH owns oil refineries in Europe; stakes in fields in Kazakhstan, Uzbekistan, Iraq, and Mexico; and hundreds of retail gas stations worldwide. In its 2024 report, the company valued these assets at about $22 billion.
In 2021, the Sunday Times estimated Bergmair’s fortune at least GBP1.2 billion ($1.6 billion).
Earlier reports by Reuters said Exxon Mobil had informed Iraq’s Oil Ministry of its interest in buying Lukoil’s controlling stake in the West Qurna-2 field.
On Oct. 22, the United States applied its first new
Russia sanctions under President Donald Trump’s second administration,
targeting the country’s largest oil companies — Rosneft and Lukoil. The Office
of Foreign Assets Control (OFAC) announced the sanctions “due to Russia’s lack
of serious commitment to a peace process to end the war in Ukraine.”