Roman Abramovich and Irina Malandina divorced after 16 years, 2 months of marriage. The settlement was reportedly about $300M. See the full timeline.
Figures are reported estimates. Last updated Oct 2026.
Reported as one of the most expensive divorces in Russian history.
Roman Abramovich, the Russian oligarch best known as the long-time owner of Chelsea Football Club, married Irina Malandina, a former Aeroflot flight attendant, in 1991. The marriage was his second, and it produced five children. It lasted about 16 years, spanning the period in which Abramovich went from a young trader in post-Soviet Russia to one of the richest men in the world. Irina largely stayed out of the public eye, and the couple's separation received far less attention than Abramovich's business dealings or his later and much more publicized divorce from Dasha Zhukova.
Abramovich built his fortune in the chaotic privatizations of the 1990s. With his partner Boris Berezovsky he acquired the oil company Sibneft in 1995 through the controversial loans-for-shares scheme, and in 2005 he sold most of his stake to the state-controlled gas company Gazprom for around $13 billion. He used that capital to diversify into steel and mining through the Evraz and Millhouse holdings and to buy Chelsea in 2003 for a reported £140 million, a purchase that made him a household name in Britain and gave him a platform for European business and political contacts.
Abramovich and Malandina married in 1991, when he was building small trading businesses. The marriage spanned his rise through Sibneft and the Yeltsin-era oil boom, and ended in 2007 after about 16 years, in a divorce that was reportedly handled in Russia rather than England. Abramovich married Dasha Zhukova in 2008, and that marriage ended amicably in 2017.
The reported settlement was about $300 million, or roughly £155 million, according to press coverage at the time. No court record or official source for the figure has been published, so it should be treated as a media estimate. Compared with a fortune that was then measured in the tens of billions of dollars, the reported sum was a small fraction of Abramovich's wealth, a point commentators made repeatedly and one that made the divorce a notable contrast with later and larger cases.
By the standards of a billionaire divorce the reported settlement was modest, and the reasons are structural. Law firms comparing the two systems have noted that Russian divorces tend to produce smaller awards than those in London, and fortunes like Abramovich's are often held through companies and structures rather than in the husband's own name, which can limit what a court is able to divide. That gap is one reason a wealthy spouse may prefer to keep a divorce in Russia while the other spouse seeks to bring the case to England.
The divorce had no visible effect on Abramovich's holdings, and he remained Chelsea's owner for another 15 years. That ownership ended after Russia's invasion of Ukraine: the UK government sanctioned Abramovich in March 2022, and Chelsea was sold in May 2022 to a consortium led by Todd Boehly and Clearlake Capital for about £2.5 billion, with the proceeds remaining frozen. Irina Malandina has kept a low profile since the divorce, and details of how she has used her settlement are not public.
At a reported $300 million the settlement is dwarfed by the $4.5 billion that a Swiss court initially awarded to Elena Rybolovleva in her case against Dmitry Rybolovlev, and by billion-dollar settlements such as Harold Hamm's. It is a useful reminder that raw fortune size does not determine a settlement: jurisdiction, asset structure and the evidence available to the court matter at least as much as the headline net worth of the payer.
Abramovich has been married three times, and the second marriage, to Irina Malandina, was the longest of the three at about 16 years. Irina had worked as a flight attendant for Aeroflot before the marriage. His later divorce from Dasha Zhukova in 2017, announced as amicable, was widely expected to produce a much larger settlement, and law firms speculated about which country's courts might hear it. The reported £155 million of 2007 was described in British press headlines as 'mere', a reflection of how large Abramovich's wealth had become.
Irina Malandina's reported settlement was about $300 million.
They married in 1991 and divorced in 2007, a marriage of roughly 16 years.
No prenuptial agreement was reported.
Yes, the family is reported to include 5 children.
Reported assets include: Cash, properties, investment holdings.
By the standards of a billionaire divorce the reported settlement was modest, and the reasons are structural. Law firms comparing the two systems have noted that Russian divorces tend to produce smaller awards than those in London, and fortunes like Abramovich's are often held through companies and structures rather than in the husband's own name, which can limit what a court is able to divide.