Late last month, Vladimir Potanin was invited to address a club of young entrepreneurs in Moscow. It was, he says, sheer pleasure.
“No one asked me about Vladimir Putin or Dmitry Medvedev,” jokes the tycoon, referring to the debate over which of Russia’s ruling “tandem” will be president next year – which he argues is not particularly important. “And no one asked me about Norilsk Nickel.”
It is hardly surprising Mr Potanin would want to avoid being defined by the struggle for control of Norilsk, the world’s biggest nickel producer, in which he has been engaged with rival oligarch Oleg Deripaska (Mr Potanin’s group has 30 per cent to Mr Deripaska’s 25 per cent) on and off since 2008. With its lawsuits, accusations of conspiracy, disputed share buy-backs and sales of stakes to third parties, the battle has done little for either man’s image. It has revived memories of Russia’s “wild east” capitalism of the 1990s.