The superyacht of a sanctioned Russian oligarch will be auctioned at Gibraltar on Tuesday, making it the first vessel of its kind to go on the block since the Russian invasion of Ukraine nearly six months ago. The luxurious, 238-foot Axioma, reportedly worth nearly $77 million, belonged to a Russian billionaire who is close to Vladimir Putin, Dmitry Pumpyansky. According to the BBC, the “monster boat” can sleep a dozen people in six cabins and “boasts a swimming pool, jacuzzi, spa, 3D cinema, jet skis, and scuba diving equipment and has space for 20 crew.”

Mr. Pumpyansky amassed his fortune through a steel pipe manufacturing company with ties to a Russian state-owned energy giant, Gazprom. While dozens of superyachts linked to Russian oligarchs sanctioned by Washington, Britain, and the EU have been confiscated in recent months, this is the first to go up for sale. 

Some Western officials, including the British deputy prime minister, Dominic Raab, have previously suggested that the assets of sanctioned Russian oligarchs be turned over to Ukrainian refugees, but such will not be the case with Mr.  Pumpyansky’s prized yacht. That is mostly because JPMorgan has a legal claim against the oligarch’s holding company, Pyrene Investments, which it claims owes the American bank more than $20 million. The Guardian reported that the claim was in effect the lever that enabled authorities at Gibraltar, a British overseas territory, to seize the yacht. According to the newspaper, JPMorgan “said the fact the billionaire had been subjected to sanctions meant the terms of the loan had been breached because it legally could not accept loan repayments from Pyrene, and asked the Gibraltar courts to detain and sell the yacht.”

With the war in Ukraine reaching a potentially decisive phase this month, the optics of the high-profile sale are less than ideal for JPMorgan, America’s largest bank. In May, Senator Warren and Congresswoman Katie Porter sent joint letters to the CEOs of both JPMorgan and Goldman Sachs in which the lawmakers said the companies’ “business dealings with Russian debt in the secondary market have the potential to undermine U.S. sanctions and fund Russia’s human rights abuses in Ukraine.” 

The letter to “Jamie Dimon of JPMorgan Chase & Company” cited a “loophole” in the Biden administration’s sanctions on Russia. Ms. Warren and Ms. Porter wrote that they “are seeking information on how your dealings could benefit Putin’s regime and how your institution may be profiting off of Russia’s invasion of Ukraine.”

In a news report about the lawmakers’ inquiry, American Banker said it cited reports “that the megabanks are buying up massive amounts of Russian sovereign debt, as well as debt from Russian companies tied to the government, to be resold to American-based hedge funds and other investors.” Goldman and JPMorgan have both announced plans to cease pursuing new business in Russia following the country’s invasion of Ukraine, American Banker said, “but Warren and Porter argued that the secondary-market trades, which are legal under sanctions designed to cut Russia off from global financial markets, amount to war profiteering.”

The sale of the confiscated yacht should command close to $80 million at auction, but only a sixth of that estimated take should go to JPMorgan, at least theoretically, based on the amount of money the bank claims it is owed by Mr Pumpyansky’s company. Who is to receive the remainder, if anyone, is not clear, but any sale of sanctioned Russian assets is likely to draw scrutiny from Ukraine, which has been sharply critical of many large banks since the Russian invasion.

Last month a top economic advisor to President Zelesky, Oleg Ustenko, told CNBC that banks such as HSBC, JPMorgan and Citi have flouted international law. “In our view, anyone who is financing the Russians, who are war criminals, is also committing war crimes,” Mr. Ustenko said. 

In their letter to Mr. Dimon, Ms. Warren and Ms. Porter posed numerous questions, including, “What kinds of trades and investments in Russian debt has JP Morgan facilitated since the start of the Russian invasion of Ukraine on February 24, 2022?” and “How does JP Morgan ensure that its trades and its clients trades involving Russian debt are compliant with the U.S. sanctions regime?” 

It is not clear whether the lawmakers received a response from Mr. Dimon, with whom Ms. Warren has had a testy relationship in the past. As of Monday, neither a spokesman for Ms. Warren nor a public relations representative from JPMorgan had responded to a weekend inquiry from the Sun. Ahead of the sale, a JPMorgan representative did, however, tell the Guardian: “We will politely decline comment on the Axioma matter.”