Karyo Holdings, controlled by billionaire Mikhail Prokhorov, sold its entire 15.625% stake in Russian shoe producer and retailer Obuv Rossii (OR), the company said on June 26. The buyer of the shares or the amount of the deal were not yet disclosed.

Prokhorov’s was a very successful speculative investment. He bought a stake in a private equity deal between the company’s first and second attempts to IPO.

Obuv is a classic Russian retail story. It’s offering is priced in the mid-market and focuses on the burgeoning middle class living in the regions. Russia’s footwear market is in recovery mode and has long-term growth potential as Russians own a fraction of the shoes that their western peers do, the company's CEO Anton Titov told bne IntelliNews at the time of the rare IPO in 2017.

Currently Titov owns a 50% in OR. In April, the company provided the store opening guidance for 2019, planning to open 150 new stores. As of end of March 2019, the total number of the points of sale stood at 756 stores, including 167 franchise stores.

OR more than doubled its IFRS net profit in 1Q19, posting bottom line growth of 161% to RUB217mn (up by 126% to $3mn in US dollar terms). The company's Ebitda was up by 77% y/y, with both net profit and earnings beating consensus expectations for the reporting quarter. 

Since 2016 Prokhorov has been selling off his assets in Russia after an alleged  "imperative recommendation" from Kremlin.

His downfall was linked by Vedomosti daily to Prokhorov's short-lived political ambitions in 2012, investigations of the RBC media holding he owned that were hostile to President Vladimir Putin and his family, and the conflict his team in Quadra had with the notorious oilman Igor Sechin, which culminated in searches in Quadra's and Oneksim holdings' offices in March 2016.