Moscow, Russia: Russia’s billionaires league is mushrooming again having added 50 percent more names in the past year, with state bailouts and a stock market rally putting many oligarchs back in the game.
   
Popular business magazine Finans, which traditionally publishes its list two months ahead of the benchmark US Forbes’ Russia list, said some 77 businessmen in Russia were worth over US$1 billion ($1.4 billion) compared to 49 a year ago.
   
Most Russian tycoons obtained their oil and metals empires during controversial privatisations in the post-communist mid-1990s.

Some are famous for ostentatious displays of wealth.
   
Arguably the most famous is the owner of English soccer club Chelsea, Roman Abramovich, the only tycoon named by Finans.
   
“As before, Roman Abramovich is among the three most rich and has enough money to sponsor Chelsea for at least another 100 years,” said Finans.
   
When Finans published its list two years ago, Russia trailed only the US as a home for the mega-rich with 101 dollar billionaires, but a collapse in oil and metals prices halved the number in 2009.
   
This year, the changes are spectacular again as commodity prices recovered and the Russian stock market more than doubled in value, making the 2010 rich list the second biggest in Finans’ history.
   
Displays of wealth
   
“The previous list was a reflection of the pessimistic mood of that time. But everything has changed again in just one year,” Finans, which will publish the full list on Monday, said on its web site.
   
“Generous financial injections from governments from all over the world in financial markets combined with direct support of billionaires in Russia have had an impact,” it added.
   
The threshold for getting among the top 10 was US$9.95 billion this year and the combined wealth of Russia’s 10 richest tycoons was US$139.3 billion, almost double the US$75.9 billion in 2009 but still short of $221 billion in 2008.
   
Last year, Finans dethroned indebted oligarch Oleg Deripaska, the owner of aluminium giant RUSAL, from the top of its list and put Russia’s most eligible bachelor, outspoken and controversial tycoon Mikhail Prokhorov as Russia’s richest man.
   
A flurry of Russian firms are planning initial share offerings this year to take advantage of the recovering global markets which may boost the rich list further and reveal to the world the names of new potential Western soccer clubs and luxury mansion owners.