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Rising Sun yacht: The luxurious world of Larry Ellison and David Geffen’s nautical retreat

Rising Sun is a notable super yacht known for its size and high-profile owners. Here are some key details about the Rising Sun yacht.

Brief Overview

Rising Sun was originally built for American business magnate Larry Ellison , the co-founder of Oracle Corporation. However, Ellison later sold a significant portion of the yacht to music and film producer David Geffen. Today it is co-owned by Larry Ellison and David Geffen.

Rising Sun is approximately 454 feet (138 meters) in length, making it one of the largest yachts in the world at the time. Its impressive size allows for a wide range of amenities and luxuries.

Design and Features

The yacht boasts a stunning exterior design and a luxurious interior. It’s equipped with multiple decks, a swimming pool, a basketball court that can be converted into a helipad, and a variety of dining and entertainment spaces. The interior features opulent staterooms and lounges.

Cruising Range

Rising Sun is powered by powerful engines, which give it a a top speed of around 28 knots (about 32 mph or 52 km/h). This allows the yacht to cover vast distances on the open sea.

Part 1: Ownership of Rising Sun

Who are the notable owners of the rising sun yacht.

The Rising Sun yacht is co-owned by two prominent figures in the world of business and entertainment: Larry Ellison and David Geffen.

Who is Larry Ellison?

Larry Ellison is a renowned American entrepreneur and the co-founder of Oracle Corporation, one of the world’s leading software and cloud computing companies. With his immense success in the tech industry, Ellison has amassed substantial wealth and has used some of it to indulge in a life of luxury, including the ownership of Rising Sun.

Who is David Geffen?

David Geffen is a prominent figure in the entertainment industry. He is a music and film producer, co-founder of Asylum Records, and a co-founder of DreamWorks SKG. Geffen is known for his influence in the world of entertainment and, like Ellison, enjoys the opulent lifestyle provided by the Rising Sun yacht.

Part 2: Size, Design, and Features

How large is the rising sun yacht.

Rising Sun is a colossal super yacht, measuring approximately 454 feet (138 meters) in length. Its vast dimensions are a testament to its opulence and the array of amenities it offers.

What are the design and features of Rising Sun?

Rising Sun is an architectural marvel, featuring a stunning exterior design and an interior that exudes luxury. Onboard, guests can enjoy multiple decks, a lavish swimming pool, a basketball court that converts into a helipad, and a variety of dining and entertainment spaces. The interior is adorned with opulent staterooms and lounges, making it a floating palace on the seas.

Part 3: Cruising Range of Rising Sun

What is the cruising range of the rising sun yacht.

Thanks to its powerful engines, Rising Sun has an impressive cruising speed of approximately 28 knots, which translates to about 32 miles per hour (52 kilometers per hour). This remarkable speed allows the yacht to cover vast distances during its journeys across the ocean, providing its passengers with access to a wide range of destinations.

Part 4: Notable Guests of Rising Sun

Who are some of the notable guests who have been aboard rising sun.

Rising Sun has been a favored choice for hosting celebrities and high-profile events. Some of the notable guests who have had the privilege of experiencing the yacht’s luxury include:

• Oprah Winfrey : The iconic talk show host and media mogul has been spotted aboard Rising Sun, enjoying the yacht’s lavish amenities.
• Steven Spielberg : The renowned filmmaker and director has also graced the decks of Rising Sun, adding a touch of Hollywood glamour to its guest list.
• Tom Hanks : The beloved actor Tom Hanks has enjoyed the yacht’s hospitality during his time on the open seas.
• Bruce Springsteen : The rock legend Bruce Springsteen is another famous personality who has been a guest aboard Rising Sun, making his voyages truly unforgettable.

What makes Rising Sun a preferred choice for such guests?

Rising Sun’s opulent interior, world-class amenities, and exceptional service make it a sought-after destination for celebrities and high-profile individuals. Its spacious decks and luxurious accommodations provide the perfect backdrop for relaxation and entertainment, ensuring that every voyage is a memorable experience for its guests.

In conclusion, the Rising Sun yacht, co-owned by Larry Ellison and David Geffen, represents the epitome of luxury on the high seas. With its impressive size, breathtaking design, remarkable cruising range, and a list of notable guests that includes some of the biggest names in entertainment and business, it continues to be a symbol of opulence and indulgence in the world of super yachts. Whether you’re interested in its ownership, design, or the celebrities who have graced its decks, the Rising Sun yacht is a true icon of maritime luxury.

Technical specifications and additional details about the Rising Sun yacht

Length: Approximately 454 feet (138 meters)

Rising Sun has a steel hull and aluminum superstructure with a beam of 18.5m (60.70ft) and a 5m (16.40ft) draft.

Estimated to be around 7,500 tons

Cruising Speed: Approximately 28 knots (32 mph or 52 km/h)

Maximum Speed: Around 30 knots (34.5 mph or 55.5 km/h)

Crew Members

The Rising Sun yacht typically employs a large crew to ensure top-notch service and maintenance. The exact number can vary but may range from around 45 to 55 crew members, including officers, chefs, stewards, and technical staff.

Positions of Crew Members

The crew members on Rising Sun are organized into various departments, including deck, engineering, interior, and more. Specific positions can include captain, first officer, stewardesses, engineers, deckhands, and chefs, among others.

Number of Rooms

Rising Sun boasts an impressive number of rooms and accommodations, including numerous staterooms and suites for guests. While the exact count can vary, it typically offers accommodations for around 16 to 18 guests.

Other Amenities

Rising Sun offers a wide range of luxurious amenities, including:

• Multiple dining areas for formal and casual dining experiences.
• A stunning swimming pool with jacuzzi features on the deck.
• A basketball court that can be converted into a helipad.
• A dedicated cinema room for entertainment.
• An on-deck bar for social gatherings.
• A gymnasium and spa facilities for guests to relax and stay active during their voyage.
• A high-quality audio-visual entertainment system throughout the yacht.
• A library and study area for quiet moments.

Support Vehicles

Super yachts like Rising Sun often come equipped with support vessels, such as smaller boats and jet skis, for various recreational activities and transportation to and from shore.

Additional Information

• Rising Sun is equipped with state-of-the-art navigation and communication systems to ensure safety and efficient travel.
• The yacht’s interior is designed with opulent materials, including marble and rare woods, adding to its luxurious atmosphere.
• It has a range of environmental and sustainability features, including advanced waste management and energy-efficient systems.

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RISING SUN Yacht – Exceptional $400M Superyacht

RISING SUN yacht is currently the 16th largest motor yacht in the world at a length of 138.6 meters (454 ft).

She was built by Luerssen in Bremen, Germany, and launched in June of 2004.

RISING SUN yacht interior

The interior of the RISING SUN yacht was styled by Seccombe Design, a small and highly specialized design company. The 138.6 meter-long vessel was their largest project to date. She was last refitted in 2011 and fully updated to fit modern standards. The interior of RISING SUN is classically styled with lots of dark elements and wooden features.

She comes with a gym, a grand piano, multiple swimming pools, a beauty salon, and a spa which includes a sauna.

Sixteen guests can be welcomed aboard the super yacht’s eight suites. A further 45 crew members find space in 30 cabins below the deck.

Specifications

The RISING SUN yacht is powered by four MTU engines which allow her to reach top speeds of up to 30 knots although her cruising speed lies at 26 knots.

She was built by Luerssen , one of the most famous shipyards for luxury yachts in the world. Her total volume lies at 7841 tons making her one of the largest motor yachts in the world not only by length but also weight.

Her beam measures 19 meters (62.4 ft) and her draft is 4.85 meters (15.1 ft). The built-in at-anchor stabilizers allow her guests to be comfortable even during rough seas.

The exterior of the RISING SUN yacht was developed by the superyacht designers Bannenberg & Rowell.

Dickie Baneberg’s father was one of the most legendary designers of all time in the industry, sometimes even called the father of yacht design.

His son is continuing his legacy and elements of Jon Bannenberg’s style can still be recognized in this work. With her many separate windows RISING SUN almost looks like a small cruise ship.

She is all-white, in classical yacht design with a steel hull and aluminum superstructure. In addition to her covered decks, she features a large open-air space at the bow as well as one at the aft of the vessel.

The RISING SUN yacht originally cost an estimated US $200 million when she was launched in 2004. However, due to refits and sales RISING SUN is now valued at a price of US $570 million.

Her annual running costs lie somewhere between US $25 and 40 million.

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A Closer Look at the $200 Million Rising Sun Superyacht

There are a few different categories of yachts in the world. As a yacht enthusiast you might hear a few different terms being thrown around in the descriptions, such as Super yacht up to 100 feet in length or Mega yacht up to 300 feet. These are the larger water craft and there is even a giga yacht which are those that are over 300 feet in length. With this in mind, the Rising Sun, which is often referred to as a Super yacht far exceeds the parameters set for the classification, so if we're going to be particular about the classification, we'd call it a Giga yacht. However it's categorized, the Rising Sun is one of the most amazing private yachts afloat and we're going to take a closer look at the features which make this multi-million dollar ship so special.

Rising Sun Yacht built by Lurssen: A Celebrity Choice

This yacht has hosted some of the most celebrated personalities in the film and record industry as well as the political arena. Barack and Michelle Obama were seen vacationing on the Rising Sun in 2017, and it's also hosted Hollywood stars including Oprah Winfrey , Julia Roberts , Leonardo DeCaprio, Tom Hanks and others. The co-founder of Dreamworks, film producer and record executive David Geffen is the owner of the Rising Sun, which ranks as the 9th largest yacht in the world, currently. Depending on which source you consult, the cost to build this giant is estimated to be $200 million and some have it as high as $400 million but we believe that the base cost was the latter and the extra figures come from upgrades .

The history of the Rising Sun

The Rising Sun is the commissioned craft of its first owner Larry Ellison, who partnered with David Geffen and is the current CEO of the Oracle Corporation. He ordered the building of the ship from the German shipbuilding company Lürssen . The Rising Sun is the design of Jon Bannenberg, who has since passed away. The ship was delivered to Mr. Ellison in 2004, who shared ownership with David Geffen until 2010, when he decided that it was too large, so he sold his share to Geffen, who is now the sole owner of the yacht and Ellison bought a smaller yacht.

Specifications and details

The Rising Sun yacht is constructed of a strong aluminum superstructure with a displacement steel hull and teak decks, in accordance with Germanischer Lloyd classification society rules. The ship requires 4 MTU 12,061 horsepower diesel engines to propel it though the water. The average cruising speed is 26 knots and the top speed of the ship is 30 knots. To make the yacht more comfortable and safe in rough waters, it is fitted with zero speed stabilizers for times when she is at anchor. The Rising Sun measures 453.97 ft in length with a 62.34 ft beam, a draft of 16.08 ft and gross tonnage of 7841 tons. The exterior was designed by Bannenberg & Rowel and the interior by Seccombe Design. It was built by Lurssen and refit in 2004 and 2011. At the time of the sale it was the 6th largest yacht in the world, but other new superyachts have displaced it to the 9th position.

Luxury amenities

It takes a crew of 45 to maintain and operate this massive vessel and they are housed in 30 cabins. The guests are housed in 8 cabins which can accommodate between 16 and 18 guests comfortably. The yacht has been designed with more than 8,000m² of living space, allowing for larger gathering areas as well as plenty of places to find privacy from the crowd of guests. There are a total of five decks with 82 rooms aboard the yacht. Some of the luxury amenities include a spa and gym so guests don't need to miss out on their daily workout routines. The Rising Sun is also quipped with a lift/elevator to take guests between the five decks. For practicality so guests/owners can come and go from any location, there is also a helipad on board. For fun in the sun there is a swimming pool as well as underwater lights for excellent illumination, and a sauna for relaxation. The ship also features air conditioning throughout the 82 rooms so guests can achieve the optimal room temperatures, even on hot days at sea, and there is also a Tender Garage, as well as a Cinema large enough to accommodate all guests for entertainment.

Final thoughts

The Rising Sun has only had two owners since it was built in 2004. Co-owners Larry Ellison and David Geffen shared it for a period of time, then Ellison sold his share to Geffen who is now the sole owner. The yacht was once the sixth largest yacht in the world, but is still considered a wonder coming in at ninth place. It's packed to the hilt with luxury amenities and there is plenty of space aboard with five decks and 82 rooms. The ship which cost $200 million to build is now valued somewhere between $3 and $4 million, and it has only increased in value with the passage of time and no doubt numerous upgrades to suit the preferences of the owner. It's served as the vessel that provides a source of recreation for some of the most famous people in the world including some of our most beloved Hollywood stars and even a former president and first lady. The Rising Sun is truly one of the most magnificent yachts that has ever been created, and those who are fortunate enough to be invited on board are in for a top notch luxury experience.

Written by  Dana Hanson

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David Geffen’s Yacht: Everything You Want To Know

David Geffen is a businessman most famous for his work running record labels and a film studio. His net worth is estimated at around $7.7 billion and he’s also been the owner of one of the world’s largest yachts for some years now. He owns a second yacht as well, one called Pelorus that clocks in at 115 meters in length. That means Geffen is the owner of at least two megayachts

What is David Geffen’s Yacht Called?

Geffen named his yacht the Rising Sun and it was built back in 2004 and then refitted in 2007. The yacht was originally built by German yacht maker Lurssen and originally it belonged to Oracle founder Larry Ellison, but Geffen purchased it in 2010. Word is that Ellison thought it was just too big and ended up buying a smaller yacht that he felt was more manageable. That said, Geffen apparently owned a percentage share of the yacht since 2006.

How Big is the Rising Sun?

With a gross tonnage of 7,841 GT, the yacht is not as heavy as you might think for one of its size. The Rising Sun length clocks in at just under 453 feet with a beam of 60.7 feet. The yacht features a steel hull with an aluminum superstructure. It ranks as one of the largest yachts in the world .

How Much Did David Geffen Pay for the Rising Sun Yacht?

It’s been reported that Geffen paid Ellison a staggering $590 million for the Rising Sun however other reports suggest the vessel was $200 million. Given the size of the yacht and the time it was built plus various amenities it seems more likely the true price is closer to $200 million. That’s speculation and also some educated guessing as a $590 million motor yacht sale in 2010 would likely have raised more flags in the media. It would make the Rising Sun one of the most expensive yachts ever, and that’s simply never been claimed by many sources.

The value of the luxury yacht has been speculated to currently be between $300 million and $400 million after various refits and upgrades that have been added over the years. Despite the cost there is no yacht charter available to offset that for Geffen.

How Fast is the Rising Sun Yacht?

The Rising sun has a maximum speed of 28 knots and a cruising speed of 16 knots. This is achieved by 4 MTU 20V 8000 M90 diesel engines producing 48,000 hp.

What’s the Interior of the Rising Sun Like?

A crew of 45 is needed to keep the Rising Sun operating and that includes taking care of the up to 18 guests in 9 staterooms. That includes one master suite and then 8 double suites. 

Geffen has numerous amenities on board to ensure a luxurious stay for guests who, in the past, have included people like Tom Hanks, Barack and Michelle Obama, Mariah Carey and even Jeff Bezos and Oprah Winfrey. For a short time there were stories that this was, in fact, Oprah’s yacht because she had been spotted on board in 2013 when she was on holiday. However, she was just borrowing the yacht and does not own a yacht of her own.

There is both a sauna and a beauty salon on board as well as a large swimming pool and an elevator to travel between the five decks. There are 8,000 square meters of living space available between those decks which include teak decks and bathrooms finished in onyx.

The top deck of the yacht serves as a master suit and features a double sized cinema screen. The layout has been described as being like the pit of an avocado, meaning the movie screen is embedded in the wall in a way that creates an archway that can be traveled around it. A normal sized theater exists elsewhere on the yacht for the rest of the passengers to enjoy.

In addition to movies, there’s also a full size basketball court on board if anyone is looking to get into a game. The court also doubles as a helicopter landing pad. Of course there’s a well-equipped gym for working out as well. When it’s time to relax, the yacht features its own fully stocked wine cellar. 

Unfortunately, Geffen has not welcomed media onto the yacht so images of the interior are few and far between. As you can imagine, he’s a man who enjoys his privacy and doesn’t want to share his space very openly. In fact, mentioning it has backfired on him in the past.

Back in 2020, sometimes after he was spotted refueling at Sea Fuels Marine in New Bedford, Geffen made an Instagram post about how he was self-isolating on his yacht in the Grenadines during Covid. The post went over poorly with people pointing out it was a little tone deaf to the average person who doesn’t have a multi-million dollar yacht to escape on. He deactivated his Instagram shortly thereafter. 

The Bottom Line

David Geffen is a billionaire businessman known for is work in the music industry such as running Geffen Records and Asylum Records. His superyacht Rising Sun was built for $200 million though it’s been reported he paid as much as $590 million for it. The yacht is one of the largest luxury yachts in the world at 453 feet and features many amenities including a massive, double sized cinema screen, a basketball court, and a large pool.  The motor yacht is a notorious hot spot for celebrity visitors that range from Paul McCartney to Bruce Springsteen to Chris Rock, Leonardo DiCaprio and Katy Perry among many others.

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How david geffen’s yacht photos became a “status thing” in hollywood.

David Geffen's superyacht the Rising Sun has become a photo op for A-list stars such as Oprah Winfrey, Chris Rock, Steven Spielberg, Leonardo DiCaprio and even Jeff Bezos.

By Chris Gardner

Chris Gardner

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David Geffen famously shuns interviews, so his Instagram account — which the mogul-philanthropist launched in 2016 — offers the only window into his private world. And what a view.

That’s thanks in large part — 138 meters, to be exact — to Rising Sun, the superyacht he purchased in 2010 from fellow billionaire Larry Ellison, on which Geffen hosts some of the world’s most famous names from film, music, business and politics. With many of those guests smiling in photos against the backdrop of Ibiza, Mallorca or Capri for his 72,000 followers, poring over Geffen’s Insta has become a Hollywood pastime. C-suites were abuzz with this summer’s guest log: Oprah Winfrey, Gayle King, Katy Perry with fiance Orlando Bloom, Chris Rock with girlfriend Megalyn Echikunwoke, Karlie Kloss and husband Josh Kushner (brother of Jared), Goldman Sachs’ Lloyd Blankfein and wife Laura, K5 Global founder Michael Kives and wife Lydia (a nonprofit attorney), oil heir Mikey Hess and designer fiancee Misha Nonoo.

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But the yachty who inspired the most chatter was the world’s richest man, Jeff Bezos, posted Aug. 6 in a group shot with girlfriend Lauren Sanchez-Whitesell . Bezos, seen barefoot and in board shorts clutching a wine glass, has his own Instagram but never gives his 987,000 followers a glimpse at his private world. So appearing on Geffen’s, especially in the same photo as Sanchez-Whitesell, could seem like the ultimate flex for his host. But sources familiar with Rising Sun activities say Geffen, 76, is not strategic about the shots he posts.

        View this post on Instagram                   Having a great time in the Balearics A post shared by David Geffen (@davidgeffen) on Aug 6, 2019 at 3:52am PDT

“He’s just at the place in his life where he doesn’t care,” offers one. Says another well-placed industry source: “There’s a reason the most powerful people in the world show up. It is the most coveted, most exclusive and most unbelievable vacation experience ever.”

Since Geffen has been documenting his guests, he’s snapped Disney’s Bob Iger, Steven Spielberg, J.J. Abrams, NBCUniversal’s Ron Meyer, Netflix’s Ted Sarandos, Julia Roberts, Leonardo DiCaprio, Barry Diller and wife Diane von Furstenberg, Bruce Springsteen, Paul McCartney, Tom Hanks and Rita Wilson, Jerry Seinfeld, Diane Sawyer, Scooter Braun, Bradley Cooper, Mariah Carey, film executive Stacey Snider, and producers Walter Parkes and Laurie MacDonald. One couple he hosted but never posted: Barack and Michelle Obama.

By all accounts, his guests are smitten. “You are the most gracious host,” wrote Bloom to Geffen in the comments section underneath a photo of the pair. Kloss, who, like Kives and the Blankfeins, is a Rising Sun regular, once wrote “the most magnificent weekend with the most extraordinary man,” after an excursion. 

There’s a reason that many of the images Geffen posts look similar, posted from the deck or common dining areas. According to yacht expert Nick Jeffery of Nick Jeffery Yacht Publicity in Monaco, common etiquette is to photograph and post exterior shots only. If the inside quarters are ever photographed, it’s typically done by professionals in carefully curated photo shoots to protect expensive artwork and furniture. 

Jeffery suggests that Bezos, who is known to travel with his own personal security team, must have granted his permission for Geffen to post the photo, one that Jeffery says contains one glaring problem. “The photographer should have removed or topped up his glass!”

Perry and others also have posted (or reposted Geffen’s shots) on their Instas. An individual with knowledge of both Hollywood and yachting etiquette says guests should pause before pulling out a smartphone. “You can do a dry run test by taking your phone out to pretend to check a message. If you see the boat owner get antsy or look your way, put it right back. … After all, the yacht is their sanctuary.”

Rising Sun may be his sanctuary, but Geffen remains rooted to his upbringing, says author Kevin Sessums, who knows him. “For someone who is very rich and very famous he also has always been the boy from Brooklyn with his nose pressed against the window. Instagram is just a newfangled window,” says Sessums. “That’s why I’ve always loved him. For all the trappings of an elite life, he’s still pretty egalitarian regarding his outlook on life itself. He’s a mensch.”

One publicist whose client has been photographed on Rising Sun says that while A-listers value discretion, there’s not much of a downside to appearing in Geffen’s feed. “It’s a glamorous, mega-millions yacht and his groups are always the best, so you’d be hard-pressed to find somebody who is like, ‘Nah, I’m good, I don’t need my picture taken,’ ” says the rep. “It’s a status thing. When Paul Allen used to have big parties in Cannes on his yacht, people would try to pay money to get on the boat because if you’re seen there, it would be worth something. Same for David Geffen.”

But good luck scoring an invite. “There’s no way to catapult into that world without already being in that world,” explains the rep. “If you have fame, great. If you have money, great. But otherwise there’s no chance.”

        View this post on Instagram                   In Mallorca A post shared by David Geffen (@davidgeffen) on Jul 26, 2019 at 10:44am PDT

        View this post on Instagram                   Chris Rock & Megalyn Echikunwoke in Mallorca A post shared by David Geffen (@davidgeffen) on Jun 11, 2019 at 1:05am PDT

        View this post on Instagram                   Fun in Mallorca A post shared by David Geffen (@davidgeffen) on Aug 4, 2019 at 11:17pm PDT

        View this post on Instagram                   Orlando Bloom snd Rising Sun A post shared by David Geffen (@davidgeffen) on Jul 28, 2019 at 12:35am PDT

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Iconic yachts: Inside the design journey of the 138m Lürssen superyacht Rising Sun

Rising Sun was the last yacht that ever came from designer Jon Bannenberg’s drawing board (literally, as the office was then an almost CAD-free zone), and one that he was destined never to see completed.

To a degree, Rising Sun represented a back-to-basics approach and a final opportunity to work with Lürssen’s lean destroyer-type hull, which had been the platform 30 years earlier for Carinthia V and Carinthia VI (now named The One ). The similarities ended there. Rising Sun experimented with extensive use of structural glass for a clean and stripped-down profile that involved Lürssen and its sub-contractors working on engineering and systems.

Jon Bannenberg’s appointment to design Rising Sun came out of the blue after Larry Ellison had commissioned a number of studies from different designers. None seemed to have the impact that he wanted until Jon Bannenberg unveiled his initial study model one morning in London over a couple of lattes. Things moved quickly after that, and they reached an agreement in two emails without even a hint of a lawyer being involved. LE120 became the project’s codename but it did not need Enigma codebreaking skills among the yachting community to work out the vessel’s length and who had commissioned her.

Jon Bannenberg worked on many study models in the early months, including a colossal version that was shipped to Lürssen and used for an initial presentation meeting with the principal sub-contractors. The basic form did not change much from his first drawing. Among the spectacular concepts was a suspended, tube-like walkway through the main machinery spaces for visitors to see exactly what drove her at speeds of 30 knots, and an exposed Z frame structure separating the tender launching areas. This was monumental in scale but sculptural and simple to fabricate.

The exposure of structure was one of the overarching themes of his Rising Sun design – no more clearly apparent than in the web frames of the superstructure, into which the full-height glass panels were set. The initial intent was to have these in raw finished aluminium, but this subsequently got ‘value engineered’ into a metallic paint finish.

His general arrangement layouts of Rising Sun gave spacious guest cabins direct access to the exterior side decks, protected from the weather by 45-degree indents in the superstructure. There was so much space to play with that the top deck was given over entirely to owner use, while a double-height cinema was embedded like the stone of an avocado, with the corridor arcing gently around it. And, of course, a basketball court was obligatory.

All in all, Jon Bannenberg’s original concept for Rising Sun survived relatively intact after his death. The yacht divided opinion, like many of his designs, and her sheer scale – eventually growing to 138 metres – made even Larry Ellison pause for thought. But she is certainly a Bannenberg original, and somehow neatly completed the circle that started with Carinthia V and Lürssen some 30 years earlier.

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Lavish and looming, gigayacht bobbing in Portland harbor attracts curiosity and contempt

Rising Sun, the 453-foot yacht owned by entertainment mogul David Geffen, sports a gym, a wine cellar, a spa, a movie theater and can accommodate up to 16 guests and 45 crew members.

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People walk at Bug Light Park in South Portland Tuesday with the Rising Sun, a five-story, 82-room gigayacht owned by billionaire David Geffen, docked in the background in Portland. Shawn Patrick Ouellette/Staff Photographer

Some people view it as a symbol of wealth-hoarding. Others see it as a tourist attraction. Some believe it’s merely a sign of a changing Old Port. To entertainment mogul David Geffen, the 82-room, $400 million gigayacht floating in the Portland harbor is merely a part-time home.

A boat that is worth $381 million more than the most expensive home for sale on Maine Listings docked in Portland on Monday night. Though it’s not a boat, it’s not a yacht, it’s not a superyacht and it’s not even a megayacht. It’s a gigayacht and it’s the 20th largest in the world, according to the Robb Report, a chronicler of all things luxurious.

The yacht, named Rising Sun, is one of Geffen’s vacation homes. Geffen is the music and film producer behind The Eagles, Joni Mitchell, Bob Dylan and DreamWorks – the animation studio that produced, among many hits, “Shrek,” Shrek 2,” “Shrek the Third” and “Shrek Forever After.” Fifty-nine years after he launched his entertainment career, Geffen has landed himself at No. 229 on the Bloomberg Billionaires Index with a net worth of $9.14 billion.

Geffen is also pals with many celebrities, and he’s brought many of them aboard Rising Sun, including Paul McCartney, Oprah Winfrey and Julia Roberts.

Geffen’s accomplishment’s and social circle notwithstanding, all anyone could talk about in the Old Port on Tuesday afternoon was the gigayacht, itself.

“It’s friggin’ big,” said Owen Dionne, a deckhand at Portland Discovery Land Sea and Tours. Advertisement

At five stories high and 453 feet long, it’s certainly an eye-catcher. In the maritime vernacular, a yacht is generally at least 30 feet long, a superyacht is 80-100 feet long, a megayacht is 200 feet and a gigayacht stretches beyond 300 feet.

Rising Sun has a gym, a wine cellar, a spa, a movie theater and can accommodate up to 16 guests and 45 crew members, according to superyachtfan.com. It was built in 2004 by Lürssen Yachts, a German shipyard, for Oracle Corp. CEO Larry Ellison. Geffen bought it from Ellison in 2010.

This is the kind of information that Portland Discovery deckhands research to share with passengers.

The Rising Sun, a five-story, 82-room super yacht owned by billionaire David Geffen docked in Portland on Tuesday. The yacht has a gym, a wine cellar, a spa, a movie theater and can accommodate up to 16 guests and 45 crew members. Shawn Patrick Ouellette/Staff Photographer

“They all want to know who owns them,” Dionne said. “We research how many crew they have, how much they cost to run and to own. But mostly they’re just interested in the owners, though usually they’re not really famous people, they’re just rich people.”

Yachts are a dime a dozen to Dionne and Jack Coggeshall, manager at Portland Discovery. Coggeshall has seen Rising Sun many times over the course of his 11 years at Portland Discovery. But they still agree that it’s the biggest yacht they’ve seen in Portland’s waters and it’s quite a view to take in.

“It’s just unbelievable to see a private yacht that big,” Coggeshall said. Advertisement

One tidbit Dionne and Coggeshall might not have come across is the Rising Sun’s environmental impact. The diesel engines powering the gigayacht belch an estimated 16,320 tons of carbon-dioxide-equivalent gases into the atmosphere annually, almost 800 times what the average American generates in a year, according to a New York Times report citing the journal Sustainability.

IMPRESSIVE OR NOT

The gigayacht also caught tourists’ eyes at the Eastern Promenade – though not necessarily for the same reasons.

Dave and Dianne Rhodes were sitting on a bench on Tuesday afternoon taking in the distant Rising Sun. Dave Rhodes wasn’t looking at it in admiration, though.

“The obscene amount of pure spending gobs of money on nothing … the money could be used in such a better way,” he said.

The Rhodes sailed up from Rochester, New York, on their sailboat, the Lagerhead. They spent $39,000 on their boat – not necessarily cheap, but dwarfed by the value of the Rising Sun. But even if they had all the money in the world, they’d keep the Lagerhead. Advertisement

“We’re more interested in our sailboat,” Dianne Rhodes said.

Lobsterman Rob Rutter pauses on Portland’s Widgery Wharf after working on his boat Devocean. Rutter is ambivalent about the gigayacht bobbing in the harbor, saying it won’t affect his lobster prices one way or another.  Shawn Patrick Ouellette/Staff Photographer

Doug Sargent, a New Jersey resident, is similarly unimpressed by Rising Sun.

“It’s not interesting, it’s too blah,” Sargent said. “Buy that boat? It’s so far beyond comprehension that that’s not even one of my thoughts.”

However, Sargent said there are some upsides to a visitor like Geffen. Perhaps Geffen and his guests are spreading the wealth in the Old Port.

“I hope he’s helping the local economy,” he said.

Sargent, 79, lived in Portland until he was 13 years old and has watched the Old Port transform over the course of his life. It’s people like Geffen who have given the Old Port the money to change for the better, he said. Advertisement

Whether the arrival of the Rising Sun has positive or negative impacts on the city, lobsterman Rob Rutter is ambivalent. He’s making the same amount of money for his catch even when people like Geffen visit Portland.

“I didn’t even think that yacht being in town was going to make a story other than ‘it was here,’ ” Rutter said.

It’s not entirely clear where Rising Sun is floating while it awaits its next journey. According to Portland city spokesperson Jessica Grondin, it’s not at any of the city’s docks or moorings. Dionne, the Portland Discovery Land Sea and Tours deckhand, said it’s likely at Fore Points Marina, “a safe, deep harbor, specifically designed to host megayachts” that opened in 2019. Office Manager Lauren Whitney would neither confirm nor deny whether Rising Sun was on its docks. Its current coordinates, according to Marine Traffic, are in an area where there are no other marinas but Fore Points.

If so, Geffen would pay at least $3,624 a day for the dockage rate, according to the company’s website.

What say Geffen? Does he like coming to Portland? How long will he be here? How much is he spending on the ship? Is he spending any money in the Old Port? Where does he stand on the ongoing Hollywood writers and actors strike?

Who knows – a reporter tried but could not get in touch with him.

“This is not possible, he doesn’t take any calls,” said an unnamed receptionist at the David Geffen Foundation. “Thank you for trying.”

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Massive yacht turns heads along portland waterfront.

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Maine is known for its waterfront, and places like Portland are certainly no stranger to massive cruise ships and luxury yachts.

But a boat that has been docked in Portland for the last several days is certainly turning some heads.

The "Rising Sun" is owned by billionaire media mogul David Geffen. The so-called giga-yacht is one of the 20 largest yachts in the world.

It is 452 feet long, and five stories high with 82 rooms, a spa, a movie theater, a wine cellar and a full-sized basketball court. It staffs a crew of 45 people.

Many people have been heading to the Portland waterfront just to get a look.

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Meet the oligarchs: the Russian billionaires whose jets, yachts and mansions are now in the crosshairs

Some of Russia’s super rich are finding their assets in the west under threat of sanctions from the US

For a growing number of Russia’s richest and most powerful men, now would be a very bad time to take their private jets and superyachts to their mansions in the United States.

Yesterday, the White House announced it would expand the list of Russian oligarchs subject to full blocking sanctions – the highest level of restrictions – as it ramps up punishment against Russia for its invasion of Ukraine. Some of the newly named oligarchs overlapped with a list of Russian elites on whom the European Union imposed sanctions earlier this week, although there were some notable differences.

The federal government won’t just stop at freezing these targets’ assets, but will seize them, Joe Biden announced in his State of the Union address on Tuesday.

In charge of appropriating these assets will be KleptoCapture , a newly announced justice department taskforce, with support from the treasury department, FBI, IRS and other federal agencies. Under US law, the justice department may use civil forfeiture to confiscate the proceeds from foreign crimes, including corruption, when they are found in the United States.

Their efforts will complement those of a transatlantic taskforce announced over the weekend between the United States, France, Germany, Italy, the United Kingdom, Canada and the European Commission.

“We are joining with our European allies to find and seize your yachts, your luxury apartments, your private jets. We are coming for your ill-begotten gains,” Biden said.

The Feds may have their work cut out. US regulations are lax when it comes to requiring disclosures of real estate transactions by foreign individuals, making the country a prime destination for Russian’s uber-rich looking to snap up prime properties without scrutiny.

Other favorite toys of oligarchs like planes and boats are commonly registered through shell companies. And many of those luxury craft have begun traveling toward extradition-free territories such as the Maldives, according to Bloomberg News .

Here’s an introduction to the Russian oligarchs now joining the US sanctions list – as well as a few others who haven’t been targeted yet, but have notable US ties.

Alisher Usmanov

Russians know Alisher Usmanov as one of Vladimir Putin’s “favorite” oligarchs. The country’s richest man until 2015, Usmanov owns a majority stake in Russia’s second-largest phone network, MegFon, and a large stake in the iron and steel giant Metalloinvest.

But few Americans know that Usmanov also helped give us Facebook. The billionaire began investing in the social network in 2009, when Zuckerberg’s firm was having trouble accessing funding in the wake of the financial crisis. Usmanov ultimately poured over $900m into the firm, owning as much as 10% of the company before selling his stake in 2014 and netting himself billions. He was also a major investor in Apple, Twitter, LinkedIn, Groupon and Zynga.

Usmanov was subjected to sanctions by the EU on Monday, and on Wednesday German authorities seized his $600m megayacht , the Dilbar – which boasts the world’s largest yacht-based indoor swimming pool. On 3 March he was among those added to the sanctions list by the US. The oligarch still has a $200m private Airbus A340.

The Rotenbergs

Long before brothers Arkady and Boris Rotenberg became two of Russia’s wealthiest tycoons, they were teenage Vladimir Putin’s judo training buddies, a role they continued into adulthood. Clearly they were good at it, because after Putin became president he rewarded the brothers with the control of large state-owned enterprises and lucrative contracts, netting them a massive fortune.

The Rotenbergs have since built a huge family empire of international investments under a web of shell companies, which has made Arkady’s son Igor a billionaire in his own right. Despite Arkady and Boris getting US sanctions after Russia’s 2014 invasion of Crimea, the brothers “continued actively participating in the US art market by purchasing over $18 million in art in the months following the imposition of sanctions”, according to a US Senate report . Rotenberg-linked shell companies continued making transactions in the US financial system worth over $91m long after the sanctions, according to the report.

In addition to Arkady and Boris, Igor and five additional family members were added to the US sanctions list this week.

Igor Shuvalov

Russia’s deputy prime minister from 2008 to 2018, Igor Shuvalov is now the chairman of VEB, the Russian development bank that finances major infrastructure projects, including the Sochi Olympics. He has claimed to be one of Russia’s cleanest officials, telling media he transferred all his wealth to Russia in 2013, and only kept it offshore before that to avoid spoiling his kids . But an investigation by the anti-corruption activist Alexei Navalny found that Shuvalov, through a shell company, bought two London luxury apartments in 2014 for $11.4m and has used a secret private jet to fly his wife’s corgis around the world because, as one of his staffers explained, “it’s not that comfortable in business class”.

He won’t be able to fly his corgis as many places now that he’s on the US and EU’s sanctions lists.

Yevgeniy Prigozhin

Legend has it Yevgeniy Prigozhin began his rise to power selling hot dogs , shortly after getting released from prison for robbery. The wiener venture was apparently a smash hit, and within years he had opened high-end restaurants that counted Russia’s leader among their clientele, earning him the nickname of “Putin’s chef” and catapulting him into the inner circles of Russia’s elite.

Americans might be more familiar with another one of Prigozhin’s businesses: the Internet Research Agency, which employed a troll army that began by supporting Russia’s 2014 invasion of Crimea, before turning its efforts to influencing the 2016 US presidential election in favor of Donald Trump. Prigozhin and the Internet Research Agency were indicted by a US grand jury in 2018 for interfering with the election, and he was added to an FBI wanted list in 2021.

He’s now on both the US and EU sanctions lists for running disinformation campaigns to support Russia’s invasion of Ukraine.

Sergey Chemezov

A former KGB officer who befriended Vladimir Putin in the 1980s while living in the same apartment building, Sergey Chemezov rose through Russia’s public and private sector in Putin’s wake, and in 2007 was appointed as CEO of Russia’s state-owned defense giant Rostec, a position he still holds today. Chemezov was sanctioned by the US in 2014 amid Rostec’s role as a supplier for Russia’s invasion of Crimea, and Washington is targeting him again, now with his family members.

According to investigative reports and allegations from the jailed activist Alexei Navalny, Chemezov’s relatives have used shell companies to accumulate eye-watering assets , including superyachts and luxury villas around the world. But Chemezov says he’s clean, telling Russian media in 2019: “I do not accumulate wealth. I don’t stuff money in the corners. I don’t have yachts or airplanes.”

Nikolai Tokarev

Another former KGB officer who served alongside Putin and Chemezov, Nikolai Tokarev took over former Soviet state assets as Putin built his political power, and in 2007 became the head of the state-controlled oil giant Transneft. The oligarch has used his position at Transneft to build a business and real estate empire, which reportedly includes sponsoring an extremely fancy palace that’s said to be personally used by Putin. Tokarev was hit by US and EU sanctions this week.

Vladimir Potanin

Reportedly the second richest man in Russia, the banker, metals mining tycoon and former deputy prime minister Vladimir Potanin was among a small circle of oligarchs who met with Putin last week as the invasion of Ukraine began.

Potanin has played a big role in American arts: he has been a board member of New York’s Guggenheim Museum for two decades, until he stepped down on Wednesday. He has also given millions to the Kennedy Center in Washington, which carved his name into a wall. He is also known to have owned property in New York City , which came to light during a divorce fight that could cost him $7bn.

Potanin isn’t currently under US sanctions, which is good news for his three megayachts and two private jets (that we know about).

Leonid Mikhelson

Russia’s richest man in 2016, Leonid Mikhelson is the founder and chairman of natural gas producer Novatek, a close friend of Putin’s, and a business partner of Gennady Timchenko, a billionaire who has been under US sanctions since 2014.

Mikhelson loves art: along with his $200m art collection, he was on the board of trustees at New York’s New Museum from 2013 to 2017, and has sponsored exhibitions at the Art Institute of Chicago and London’s Tate Modern. His ostentatious superyacht, the Pacific, can reportedly accommodate two helicopters.

But his other assets may be harder to trace. In 2017, the Panama Papers revealed that Mikhelson had used an intricate system of shell companies to secretly register a $65m Gulfstream private jet in the United States, which in most cases requires US citizenship or permanent residency.

The tycoon is not currently subject to sanctions, though his company Novatek is.

Petr Aven is the head of Alfa Group, a commercial bank subject to US sanctions that helped him amass an estimated $5.5bn fortune. A well-known collector of classical Russian paintings, Aven has lent works from his collection – reportedly worth $200m – to New York’s Museum of Modern Art and the Neue Galerie. Aven reportedly has never bought a plane or yacht, and told the FT “all my money goes in to art.” That is, of course, if you don’t count the millions he spent transforming an 8.5-acre plot in England into a “KGB-proof” mansion , complete with a bomb-proof panic room.

Last year, Aven filed a libel lawsuit against HarperCollins for a book it published about Vladimir Putin’s rise, Putin’s People.

Aven was sanctioned on Monday by the EU, which described him as “one of Vladimir Putin’s closest oligarchs” and one of “approximately 50 wealthy Russian businessmen who regularly meet with Vladimir Putin in the Kremlin”. He has not yet been placed under sanctions by the US or UK.

Mikhail Fridman

Petr Aven’s business partner, Mikhail Fridman, is Alfa Group’s founder and a Ukrainian-born Russian oligarch. Fridman has made substantial investments in the United States, which include spending a reported $1bn in 2011 to buy up distressed properties across the east coast, telling the Wall Street Journal at the time, “The American market is the most well-regulated and liquid market in the world. It has the best protection for investor rights.”

Through Fridman’s investment group, LetterOne, the billionaire also sank $200m into Uber , and $50m into the telecom startup FreedomPop. Fridman also caused a stir in 2018 when he spoke alongside Aven at a closed-door dinner hosted by the Atlantic Council, a major US foreign policy thinktank, in what critics saw as an unofficial Kremlin mission to protest against US sanctions.

Last week, Fridman became one of the first oligarchs to speak out against the invasion of Ukraine, calling it a “tragedy” and writing that “war can never be the answer.” Nonetheless, Fridman was subjected to sanctions on Monday by the EU, which named him as “a top Russian financier and enabler of Putin’s inner circle”. Like Aven, he has not yet been placed under sanctions by the US or UK.

The oligarch has a son, Alexander, who is reportedly attending NYU’s Stern business school, after a stint in Moscow selling hookah .

Alexei Mordashov

Currently Russia’s richest man, Alexei Mordashov owns a third of Tui, Europe’s biggest tourism firm, and gained his billions as the chief executive of Russia’s largest steel and mining firm, Severstal. He is also a large shareholder of the Bank of Rossiya, which has opened up branches across Russia-occupied Ukrainian territory in recent years.

Over the last two decades, the billionaire has also poured money into the United States, investing heavily through Severstal in steel companies in the midwest before selling them for $2.3bn in 2014.

Mordashov has been hit with sanctions by the EU, but the US hasn’t taken action yet. They would be interested in his Bombardier Global 6000 private jet and multiple superyachts, including the $500m Nord, which Senator Bernie Sanders noted on Tuesday had been “sailing in the Seychelles region for more than 10 days” in a Twitter thread about Russian offshore wealth.

Roman Abramovich

Roman Abramovich, the longtime owner of Chelsea FC, has been described by a member of the UK parliament as a “ key enabler ” of Putin’s regime, which Abramovich has long denied. An orphan raised by his grandparents in Siberia, Abramovich pulled himself up by his bootstraps the old-fashioned way: wriggling into the inner circles of government and then profiting hugely by selling previously state-owned assets that he acquired after the fall of the Soviet Union.

The billionaire owns one of the world’s most outlandish yachts, complete with an onboard submarine and three helicopters. He has also owned a number of ultra-expensive properties in the United States, including a trio of buildings in New York City’s Upper East Side worth more than $90m combined, which he transferred to his third wife, Darya Zhukova, in 2018.

Abramovich is not currently under western sanctions. Earlier, the British prime minister, Boris Johnson, told the House of Commons that Abramovich was “already facing sanctions” though later said he “misspoke”.

This article was amended on 7 March 2022 to clarify that Leonid Mikhelson was on the New Museum’s board from from 2013 to 2017

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U.S. Eyes $156 Million Yacht in Dubai Linked to a Russian Oligarch

The U.S. Justice Department is taking steps to seize the Madame Gu, a 324-foot luxury yacht, but it will be diplomatically thorny.

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By Kate Kelly ,  Michael Forsythe and Julian E. Barnes

DUBAI, United Arab Emirates — On a clear morning in late October, the jewel-blue hull of the Madame Gu, one of the world’s most luxurious superyachts, gleamed, its aluminum rails shimmering in the sun. Workers on the pier said they had recently seen people painting, cleaning and generally keeping the ship with its helipad and six guest staterooms in pristine condition.

In past years, such a scene would not have been noteworthy. Many superyachts come and go from Dubai’s Mina Rashid Marina, best known as the home of the Queen Elizabeth 2, the trans-Atlantic ocean liner-turned-hotel that dominates the waterfront here.

But Russia’s war in Ukraine has turned an otherwise routine tableau into a diplomatic battleground between the United States and the United Arab Emirates, an important American ally that has established itself as a safe haven for Russian money and assets out of the reach of U.S. sanctions.

The $156 million Madame Gu epitomizes the problem. In June, the United States designated the vessel, which is linked to Andrei Skoch, a Russian steel magnate and lawmaker under sanctions, as blocked property. That means the yacht cannot use American companies for its upkeep, employ U.S. citizens or even use the dollar. The Justice Department is now taking steps to seize the Madame Gu, according to people with knowledge of the plan.

But the United States can’t seize property in a sovereign nation without permission from its government. The Emirates, which has taken a friendlier position toward Moscow, is balking at cooperating with the United States to pursue oligarchs, American officials said. The Kremlin is also using oligarch-controlled companies in the Emirates to acquire war supplies that the West is trying to keep out of Russia’s reach, according to a Western official involved in the sanctions effort against Russia.

Emirati officials did not comment specifically on the Madame Gu but said in a statement that they took their role “protecting the integrity of the global financial system extremely seriously.”

A closer examination of Russian assets in the Emirates shows that even before the war in Ukraine, Dubai had become a playground for Russians with links to President Vladimir V. Putin. At least 38 businessmen or officials with ties to the Russian president own homes in Dubai that are collectively valued at more than $314 million, according to the Center for Advanced Defense Studies. Five of those owners are under U.S. sanctions.

Since the Russian invasion, Dubai has established itself as a safe haven for Russian yachts and aircraft unable to sail or fly elsewhere. After Russian jets were barred from the European Union in late February, the Emirates became the destination for 14 percent of all private flights leaving Russia, up from 3 percent before the invasion.

“It’s frustrating when you see huge assets that are sitting out there and it appears that the country is not cooperating,” said Senator Sheldon Whitehouse, Democrat of Rhode Island, referring to the Emirates. “It would be nice if there were more common cause against Putin while he’s busy shelling hospitals and schools.”

Mr. Whitehouse is sponsoring legislation that would use proceeds of the sales of seized Russian assets to help rebuild Ukraine. Senior officials at the Treasury and State Departments have also complained publicly about the situation.

U.S. officials view the presence of superyachts in places like Dubai and Bodrum, Turkey , as a symptom of wider Russian circumvention of sanctions and continued access to financial markets. Yachts have also come to symbolize the decadence of Russia’s oligarchs, especially at a time when Russian soldiers are scrounging for body armor and sleeping bags on the front lines.

Pursuing the Madame Gu

Built by the Dutch firm Feadship and put into service in 2013, the Madame Gu has a large helicopter pad on its forecastle with a hangar underneath that can double as a squash court when the chopper isn’t on board. The vessel has berthing for 36 crew members, according to one trade magazine.

Mr. Skoch, a member of Russia’s Parliament who is linked to assets worth billions of dollars, according to U.S. court filings, has had sanctions imposed on him twice by the United States, first in 2018 and then after Russia’s invasion this year. The Treasury Department has cited his “longstanding ties to Russian organized criminal groups.”

Mr. Skoch could not be reached and did not respond to messages left at his office at Parliament.

In an interview in October about the government’s broader efforts to go after the assets of oligarchs, Andrew Adams, a federal prosecutor leading the Department of Justice’s KleptoCapture task force, declined to discuss the Madame Gu. But the United States, he said, is warning companies they must not do business with individuals and assets under sanctions. The government, he said, will pursue oligarch-owned assets whose sale could be used to aid Ukraine.

“Where we know there is an asset that can potentially provide significant remuneration for Ukraine, that obviously is an attractive case to pursue,” he said.

U.S. officials are likely to use the case they made for impounding a $90 million Airbus business jet linked to Mr. Skoch in August as a blueprint for seizing the Madame Gu, said people familiar with the plan.

That means investigators will aim to show that the owner of the vessel, or the companies that have been providing services to it, have intersected with the U.S. financial system.

“If there are U.S. dollars or a U.S. nexus associated with supporting this vessel, massive enforcement actions could take place,” said Adam M. Smith, a former official overseeing sanctions at the Treasury Department. Companies that provide support to entities under sanctions could potentially face their own sanctions, said Mr. Smith, who is now a lawyer at Gibson Dunn in Washington.

This year the United States has carried out two high-profile seizures of yachts tied to Russians under sanctions, working with cooperative governments. The $300 million Amadea was taken in Fiji in May and sailed to San Diego under an American flag. In April, the United States worked with Spanish police to seize the $90 million Tango.

A Problematic Partner

Diplomatically, the Emirates has been reluctant to take a clear anti-Russian position when it comes to the war in Ukraine. Sheikh Mohammed bin Zayed Al Nahyan, president of the United Arab Emirates, recently met with Mr. Putin in St. Petersburg, and the Emirati foreign minister recently hosted his Russian counterpart. Yet Sheikh Mohammed has also talked with Volodymyr Zelensky, the president of Ukraine, more than once and recently gave the country $100 million in humanitarian aid.

The United States has publicly expressed dismay over the mixed messages.

During a visit to Dubai in June, Wally Adeyemo, the U.S. deputy treasury secretary, warned of the need for vigilance and proactive steps in combating Russian evasion. That same month Barbara Leaf, the State Department’s under secretary for Near East Affairs, said at a congressional hearing that regarding the Emirates, she was “not happy at all with the record at this point” on sanctions enforcement. Mr. Adeyemo reiterated his concerns in a meeting with Emirati officials in October in Washington.

A senior State Department official said in a statement to The New York Times that the agency continues “to reinforce the importance of conducting enhanced due diligence to prevent sanctions evasion and investigating allegations of such activity” to the Emirates.

The Treasury Department declined to comment on the Madame Gu or the relationship with the Emirates.

Last month, the Treasury Department announced it had placed sanctions on an Emirates-based company, Constellation Advisors Ltd., that the American government said was operating on behalf of a nephew of another Russian oligarch, Suleiman Kerimov. Mr. Kerimov, according to American court documents, was the owner of the Amadea superyacht .

American officials are also worried the Russian government is using the Emirates to acquire military supplies for its war in Ukraine. On Nov. 15, the Treasury Department imposed sanctions on two Emirates-based transportation firms that had worked with another Iranian firm under sanctions, which in turn had helped transport drones and personnel from Iran to Russia.

Moored in Dubai

Based on a recent visit to Dubai’s Mina Rashid Marina , where the Madame Gu is moored, it is clear that international companies are playing a critical role in its care.

The Emirates-based company DP World, through its subsidiary P&O Marinas , oversees the pier where the Madame Gu is moored. Employees from another DP World subsidiary , World Security, staff the small guard box at the entrance. That makes DP World, which is owned by Dubai’s royal family, potentially vulnerable to American sanctions.

DP World “fully complies with all applicable local and national laws and intends to continue doing the same regarding the Madame Gu and other vessels utilizing our services,” said Adal Mirza, a spokesman for the company. He added that DP World had not yet heard from the United States or other countries that had placed Mr. Skoch under sanctions, including Britain and the European Union.

A generator set that dock workers said in late October was powering the Madame Gu — two container-like structures near its stern — bore the distinctive orange logo of Aggreko , a British company. The generator set was connected to the superyacht by thick cords; one of the containers was emitting grayish exhaust.

At the Mina Rashid Marina, soon after Aggreko was contacted by The Times, workers removed the generator. “Having identified that the generator was being used to power a vessel that is allegedly connected to a sanctioned person, we immediately terminated this rental and have since recovered the generator,” the company said in a statement.

Mr. Mirza, the DP World spokesman, said the Aggreko generator had been replaced with one from a local supplier.

P&O Marinas arranged for the diesel generator to provide power for the Madame Gu because that part of the pier, a holding area, has no shore-supplied electric power, said a port official in Dubai, who spoke on the condition of anonymity because he is not authorized to talk to the press.

“At the end of the day, if the U.A.E. hasn’t imposed sanctions, it’s not really their job to enforce other countries’ laws within their borders,” said Nabeel Yousef, a Washington-based partner at the law firm Freshfields, where he runs the sanctions practice. Nevertheless, “companies should not take comfort in the fact that their country has not imposed sanctions,” he added, “because even the smallest connection to the U.S. can lead to U.S. penalties.”

There has also been a notable absence onboard the Madame Gu in recent weeks: a flag. Unlike other ships moored nearby, including the Quantum Blue, a superyacht linked to the billionaire Sergei Galitsky, the Madame Gu appears to be stateless, apparently having been deflagged by the Cayman Islands.

Cayman Islands officials didn’t respond to an emailed inquiry about the ship’s status.

If DP World were to face fallout from U.S. sanctions enforcers, it wouldn’t be the first time the company has been the focus of attention in Washington. In 2006, DP World was seeking to manage some terminal operations at six American ports but dropped out of the deal after a bipartisan uproar in Congress.

Anton Troianovski contributed reporting from Turin, Italy, and Oleg Matsnev from Berlin.

Kate Kelly covers money, influence, and policy as a correspondent in the Washington bureau of the Times. Before that, she spent twenty years covering Wall Street deals, key players and their intersection with politics. She is the author of three books, including "The Education of Brett Kavanaugh." More about Kate Kelly

Michael Forsythe is a reporter on the investigations team. He was previously a correspondent in Hong Kong, covering the intersection of money and politics in China. He has also worked at Bloomberg News and is a United States Navy veteran. More about Michael Forsythe

Julian E. Barnes is a national security reporter based in Washington, covering the intelligence agencies. Before joining The Times in 2018, he wrote about security matters for The Wall Street Journal. More about Julian E. Barnes

Our Coverage of the War in Ukraine

News and Analysis

Ukrainian authorities said that a Russian missile attack on Odesa had killed at least 16 people and had injured 55 others , the latest in a series of deadly air assaults on the southern Ukrainian port city.

Chancellor Olaf Scholz of Germany and President Emmanuel Macron of France met in Berlin to smooth over their differences on how to support Ukraine in its war  with Russia and to allay concerns that the Franco-German “engine of Europe” is sputtering.

With its army short of ammunition and troops to break the deadlock on the battlefield, Ukraine has increasingly taken the fight behind Russian lines, attacking oil infrastructure deep in Russian territory .

Electronic Warfare: Drones have become a critical weapon for both Russia and Ukraine. But Moscow’s capability to overpower Ukrainian signals  by broadcasting on the same frequencies at higher power is putting Kyiv at a disadvantage.

Helping the War Effort: Since the early days of the war, thousands of Ukrainian volunteers have led crowdfunding efforts that have been crucial in supplying the military with equipment. But as the conflict drags on, it is becoming harder to raise money .

Holding a Sliver of Hope: A Russian mother knows her son, a conscript, died 14 months ago in a battle in eastern Ukraine. But she is still waiting for him.

How We Verify Our Reporting

Our team of visual journalists analyzes satellite images, photographs , videos and radio transmissions  to independently confirm troop movements and other details.

We monitor and authenticate reports on social media, corroborating these with eyewitness accounts and interviews. Read more about our reporting efforts .

Inside Florida's 'Little Moscow,' where Russian money flows thanks to 'rich daddies' snapping up real estate

• "Little Moscow" is the nickname for Sunny Isles Beach, Florida, which is flowing with Russian money.
• Previously a strip of motels, the island was revitalized in the 1990s with luxury developments.
• Many Russians snapped up properties, but they're afraid sanctions could prevent them from buying more .

Welcome to "Little Moscow."

Like its namesake city, it's home to many Russian elites. Unlike it's namesake city, it's located on a small strip of land near Miami: Sunny Isles Beach, Florida.

"They love to be here, and they like to spend their money and enjoy their life," Lana Bell, a real-estate agent, recently told the News Nation correspondent Brian Entin , referring to her wealthy Russian clientele.

Russian money has brought a real-estate boom to the region over the years, but now these power players are afraid they might not be able to enjoy the Miami sunshine much longer. As Entin reported, they're worried the escalating Russia-Ukraine conflict will blacklist them from buying American real estate, although Bell said it hasn't been a problem so far.

However, existing sanctions from past political events already slowed their buying efforts in recent years, and Biden has said the US will seize luxury apartments from Russian oligarchs with wealth parked in the country. But not all of Little Moscow's residents are wealthy, and not all of them support the war. 

Here's a look at the rise of Little Moscow and the lives of the Russians who made it happen.

Sunny Isles Beach is a 1.5-mile strip of island that sits between the Atlantic Ocean and Intracoastal Waterway in South Florida. It's about a 40-minute drive to downtown Miami, depending on traffic.

Sunny Isles Beach is located in northeastern Miami-Dade county. As of 2020, it's home to 22,342 people . The most recent data from the Census' American Community Survey that tracked population from 2015 to 2019 shows that there are 1,079 Russian-born residents living there — more than any country in Europe or Asia.

It's a place where beachfront high-rise hotels and condos dot the coastline, towering over an idyllic scene of white-sand beaches and sparkling turquoise water. Compared to the dark and brutal winters of Russia, it's a slice of paradise.

Before becoming a Russian luxury hot spot, the city was full of quirk and charm thanks to beachfront motels and tourists.

Fred Grimm wrote in the South Florida Sun Sentinel that the city was "once a linear tableau of South Florida kitsch, a seaside strip of themed motels, offering homage to ancient Egypt, Rome, the wild west, Polynesia, American Indians and so many nautical motifs, including Neptune and his water nymphs."

"Motel Row," a strip of 30 motels along the beach, was built in the 1950s and 1960s, when the city was known as Sunny Isles (before that it was called North Miami Beach). Tourism slowed its roll in the 1970s, resuming some 20 years later when most of the motels were replaced with luxury hotels, and Sunny Isles was renamed Sunny Isles Beach.

The city's luxury-development boom that first began in the 1990s revitalized the city's economy, which began to see an influx of wealth.

The median home value in Sunny Isles is $555,042 , higher than the $469,562 median home value in Miami. The most expensive home in the area currently listed on Sotheby's is $13.9 million , and condos can cost as much as  $35 million . 

It's a place of well-known luxury. Consider the Porsche Design Tower , where residents can use an elevator for their cars. And the iconic Acqualina Resort was named the country's best continental resort four years in a row by US News & World Report . Nightly rates at the five-star resort start at $2,500 a night . 

Among these developments are several Trump Towers, a brand that has held a huge appeal among Russian investors looking to move their money in the post-Soviet economy.

Trump doesn't actually own the buildings but licensed the use of his name there, The Washington Post reported . Real-estate agents told the Post in 2016 that Trump's name carries weight among the European, South American, and Asian elite, but especially among Russian oligarchs.

"When Russians get here, the first thing they ask is, 'Where is the Trump building?'" Ilya Masarsky, real-estate developer who has worked with Russian investors in the US, told The Post. 

Jose Lima, a salesperson for the company that developed the region's Trump towers, said at the time that Russian speakers bought about one-third of the 500 units he sold. 

A 2017 Reuters investigation found that at least 63 members of Russia's elite spent nearly $100 million buying property in Trump buildings in the region, including the nearby city of Hollywood. Reuters called some of the buyers "politically connected businessmen," adding that none seemed to be part of Putin's inner circle.

"Russian patriots are happy here; Sunny Isles is a happy place," Bell, the real-estate agent, told The Daily Beast in 2019 . "Russian men make money at home, they visit their Miami property just for a few months in winter. Some of these rich daddies are in their fifties or older, while their women are in their twenties; the beach is packed with really young pregnant Russian girls, girls with babies." 

A past Miami Herald investigation found that some of these buyers were the targets of US government investigations. Experts in illicit financing said Russian money gave the city its nickname of Little Moscow.

The Miami Herald found in 2016 that at least 13 personal or company buyers in the Trump Towers were investigated by the government, including a Russian-American organized-crime group and a Mexican banker accused of robbing investors. It also found that about 60% of the units are owned by shell companies, which only hold assets like real estate and can be involved in money laundering.

Experts more recently told the Herald's Michael Wilner that illicit financing has helped Russians spend years snapping up properties along Florida's southeastern coast. They estimated that Russia's elite had more than $1 trillion in offshore accounts, which they said was disproportionally held in South Florida property.

As Julia Friedlander, director of the Atlantic Council's Economic Statecraft Initiative, told the publication, "We know what's happening based on patterns of behavior and observations from various sources, just like parts of Manhattan and parts of London. They're known as places where real estate will reliably retain its value."

The greater Miami region that Sunny Isles Beach is part of is also a popular place for birth tourism. Russian women have fueled a baby boom there in recent years.

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As NBC News reported in 2018 , having a baby in Miami is considered a status symbol in Moscow. Russian birth tourists told the publication that giving birth there means getting an American passport and better medical care. It's a legal act, as long as documents are filled out honestly, that allows their children the right to American citizenship and to sponsor their parents for a green card once they turn 21.

Wealthier Russians even hire agencies that offer birth-tourism packages that cost anywhere from $50,000 to $100,000, according to NBC News. Some of these companies offer Trump apartments as part of the package, the Daily Beast's Katie Zavadski reported . For $84,700, expectant Russian mothers can get an apartment in a Trump Tower with a gold-tiled bathtub and chauffeured Mercedes-Benz. 

Not all of the money flowing into Little Moscow is from Russia, nor is it all "dirty." And not all of the people who live there are wealthy.

The Herald's Wilner reported that the area has also seen investments by overseas buyers in Europe and Latin America.

And, as Ari Odzer reported for local outlet NBC Miami , Sunny Isles Beach is also a sanctuary for refugees from the old Soviet Union and Russians on tourist visas. For this reason, he said, it's also known as Little Kyiv, Little Odessa, and Little Minsk. 

Locals told Odzer that the Russia-Ukraine conflict is dividing residents, with some supporting Putin and others who don't but are too afraid to say anything. Odzer wrote "the fear of Putin is a real phenomenon," considering he could barely get any Russians to speak on the record about their president.

Russian real-estate purchasing has been slowing down in recent years because of sanctions.

Tightened US sanctions in light of Moscow's interference in the US elections, as well as the Kremlin banning thousands of rich Russian law-enforcement officials from traveling abroad, left many Russians renting or selling their Sunny Isles Beach condos, the Daily Beast's Anna Nemstova reported in 2019 . 

"Russians can be easily recognized by their Bentleys and Rolls-Royces," Bell, the Russian real-estate agent, told Nemstova at the time. "But this year the sales have gone down. It is becoming problematic for the Russian elite to take their money out of the country; and here the rules demand full disclosure, the name of the buyer and the source of money."

However, Little Moscow still held the attention of "Russian corrupt bureaucrats," Ilya Shumanov, the deputy head of Transparency International, added. Those who could still travel came during the winter and conducted deals at restaurants in the Bal Harbor mall before returning home to conduct business again, Nemstova wrote.

Brokers also recently told Wilner that Russian purchases have dwindled in the past few years, but said that could change with new developments like the Bentley Tower and the St. Regis Sunny Isles.

Now, Russian elites in the area are worried new sanctions stemming from the Russia-Ukraine conflict could prevent them from buying real estate.

President Joe Biden issued sanctions last week targeting Russia's elite and their families and restricting the Kremlin's ability to access Western financial institutions.

"We are extending the reach of US sanctions to prevent the elites close to Putin from using their kids to hide assets, evade costs, and squander the resources of the Russian people," a National Security Council official told Wilner. "This is a new approach."

While Little Moscow's elites are worried future sanctions will threaten their lifestyle, experts told Wilner the sanctions currently in place were unlikely to have a strong effect in South Florida. 

Anders Åslund, a Swedish economist and the author of "Russia's Crony Capitalism: The Path From Market Economy to Kleptocracy," doesn't think this will affect the Russian rich in the greater Miami region that Little Moscow is in. He told Wilner that the Miami Russians weren't powerful enough to feel the sanction burn.

As he put it, "These are comfortable people, rather than the top people."

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River Cruise on Luxurious Radisson Boat

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Equipped with ice-breaking technology, these huge fancy yachts are the only river cruisers running all year around. The round trip journey takes two and a half hours and floats past all the big sights like the White House, Novodevichy monastery and the Kremlin. There’s a large open air observation deck up top, while the main body of the ship houses a restaurant with a dance floor for a romantic post dinner dance. For a particularly romantic experience take one of the evening boats and admire the bright lights of the city skyline at night.

The most relaxing and picturesque tour that Moscow can offer: a great way to see the city center and its main attractions. This is a perfect alternative to exploring the city by car, if you only have time to do sightseeing during weekday rush hours.

Your English-speaking guide is eager to share every bit of their knowledge about the surrounding landscape, the architecture and historical details.

We conduct Moscow river tour on Radisson Flotilla boats all year around!  It’s warm inside during winter months, while there’s air conditioning during hot summer days. You may also treat yourself to drinks, lunch or dinner on board (drinks and food are not included in tour price).

The cost of an excursion with a personal guide for 1 person

Quay at Radisson Collection Hotel

Government Headquarters ("the White House")

Kievsky Railway Central

Novodevichy Convent

Luzhniki Stadium

Academy of Sciences

Monument to Peter I

Cathedral of Christ the Saviour

Moscow Kremlin

St.Basil's Cathedral

Novospassky Monastery

U-turn and back to Quay at Radisson Royal Hotel

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See photo of the meeting point