Rocco Forte Hotels has completed the buy out of the City of St Petersburg’s shares in the Astoria Joint Stock company, which owns both Hotel Astoria and Angleterre Hotel in St Petersburg. This final tranche amounted to 23% of the total shareholding. Rocco Forte Hotels now controls circa 60% of the shares and its Russian partners circa 40%. There remains a tiny minority element of 0.7%.

Rocco Forte Hotels bought its first tranche of shares in November 1997. Since then, both Hotel Astoria and Angleterre Hotel have been completely refurbished utilising the cash flows generated by the hotels. Hotel Astoria and Angleterre Hotel are adjacent in St Isaacs Square and are run as a 5-star hotel and a 4-star hotel respectively. Hotel Astoria is recognised as the No 1 hotel in the city.

Sir Rocco Forte said, We are very happy with our investment, which has been extremely successful. The climate for foreign investors has improved considerably since 1997, both in the reduction in bureaucracy and the improvement in exchange controls. We are now actively looking to develop an hotel in Moscow.
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