A $500 million superyacht thought to belong to a Russian oligarch is returning to Russia after he was sanctioned

• A superyacht said to belong to Alexei Mordashov is returning to Russia after he was sanctioned.
• Superyacht Fan says the yacht is worth $500 million and belongs to the oligarch.

A superyacht is returning to Russia after its purported owner, a Russian oligarch, was sanctioned.

Alexei Mordashov is believed to be the owner of Nord, a luxury $500 million, 465-foot vessel, according to Superyacht Fan.

The yacht is headed to Vladivostok, a city to the south of Russia and close to Japan and North Korea, where it's due to arrive on Tuesday, according to MarineTraffic and VesselFinder. Bloomberg first reported on the vessel's movement.

The West has been imposing sweeping sanctions on Russia to crush its economy and put pressure on Russian President Vladimir Putin to call off his invasion of Ukraine. The measures include sanctioning Russian elites and oligarchs and freezing their assets.

The EU sanctioned Mordashov on February 28, accusing him of "supporting actions and policies which undermine the territorial integrity, sovereignty and independence of Ukraine."

"I have absolutely nothing to do with the emergence of the current geopolitical tension and I do not understand why the EU has imposed sanctions on me," Mordashov told the Russian news outlet TASS the day after the EU sanctions were announced. He has since been sanctioned by the UK, too.

Under the sanctions, Italy has already seized a $71 million superyacht belonging to Mordashov, Reuters reported, as well as a $116 million property in Sardinia. Since the invasion started, some oligarchs have been shifting their yachts and private jets.

Nord left the Seychelles on March 12, according to MarineTraffic and VesselFinder, and was last tracked in the Singapore Strait on Tuesday. The yacht has an enclosed helicopter hangar, a swimming pool, a sauna, and a cinema, according to Superyacht Fan.

Yachtmaker Lürssen and yacht design company Nuvolari Lenard, both reported by Superyacht Fan to have developed Nord, did not immediately respond to Insider's request for comment about the vessel's ownership. Severstal, the mining company that Mordashov majority owns and controls, also did not immediately respond to Insider.

Mordashov is the main shareholder and chair of Russian steel and mining giant Severstal. He's Russia's third-richest person, per data from the Bloomberg Billionaires Index, and has a net worth of $21.8 billion, though his wealth has plummeted since Russia invaded Ukraine.

It's unproven whether Mordashov does own Nord but he's among the Russian oligarchs shuffling their assets after being sanctioned. The day he was hit by EU sanctions, Mordashov shifted his 34% stake in travel company TUI in two separate transactions. Nearly 30% went to a British Virgin Islands company believed to be controlled by his wife.

Earlier this month, Mordashov also transferred control of a $1.1 billion stake in the mining company Nordgold to his alleged wife and stepped down as a director.