Economics

Early Facebook Backer Tied to Russia Bank, Kushner Platform

Milner invested personal money in Kushner family’s Cadre
Earlier VTB funding totaled less than 5% of Milner’s DST

The Facebook Inc. application is displayed an Apple Inc. iPhone 5 in this arranged photograph in Washington, D.C., U.S., on Monday, Jan. 27, 2014. Facebook Inc. is expected to release earnings data on Jan. 29.Photographer: Andrew Harrer

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By David Kocieniewski, Tom Metcalf, and Caleb Melby

November 4, 2017 at 3:31 AM UTC

Updated on

November 4, 2017 at 9:35 PM UTC

This article is for subscribers only.

A prominent Silicon Valley investor who was an early backer of Facebook Inc. partnered in two investments with the Russian state-controlled bank VTB Bank PJSC before it was sanctioned, his spokesman confirmed Friday.

Yuri Milner, the Russian-born founder of DST Global, also invested $850,000 of his personal money last year in Cadre, a real-estate investing platform co-founded and partially owned by the family of Jared Kushner, President Donald Trump’s son-in-law and senior adviser. Milner’s spokesman said that VTB played no part in his Cadre investment, which was done solely on the business merits of Cadre.