Timur Turlov has a unique life story, one that showcases a meteoric rise through successful entrepreneurship. This businessman from Kazakhstan has become one of the richest men in the world by entering the world of finance from an early age.
Turlov was born in 1987 in Moscow, but he had a Kazakhstani ethnic identity. In 2003, he graduated high school and, at just 16, began working in the finance world. For someone so young, he had a mighty interest in economics and would first start his career as a trader with WCI or World Capital Investments.
He graduated from MATI, a prestigious Moscow university specializing in avionics, as an economist, and quickly started working at the Uniastrum bank as a broker. Here, he first worked with American trading companies and helped build an infrastructure that supported people engaging in international brokerage with American securities, which would set the bases for his future business.
In 2008, when he was just 21, Turlov left the bank and founded Freedom Finance. This was an investment and brokerage company that focused on American stock exchanges. The company became hugely successful, reaching the market in Kazakhstan in 2012, where it quickly became a leading firm on a national level.
2019 saw a consolidation of various businesses under the Freedom Holding Corp. umbrella, which soon after helped it begin trading on Nasdaq. This was the first company from the Commonwealth of Independent States to achieve this distinction. Since this first trade, the company shares have grown in value 6 times.
Turlov led Freedom to becoming one of the most important international financial and other services provider. It has a market capitalization of over $5 billion and offices in 22 countries. At the moment, Turlov owns a majority share in the company, which landed him in the wealthiest people list in Forbes magazine in 2021 for the first time. He is currently worth around $6 billion. His success was linked to his keen decisions and to the focus on offering the public something they did not have before, the access to American brokerage through a trustworthy, significant company.
Turlov developed a whole system in Kazakhstan under the Freedom brand, including banking, retail, phone provision, insurance, telecom operators, and lifestyle services with food and travel. He continues to expand this market and 5 million people in Kazakhstan alone use the service Freedom offers. This has been one of the most successful companies to rise in this region and has propelled Turlov to financial and economic success on an international level.
Turlov is married and has six children. He resides in Kazakhstan and holds this country’s citizenship, having relinquished his Russian one in favor of the Kazakh roots he has. In addition to his interest in fiance and entrepreneurship, he is a talented chess player and is ranked as such. He is also the head of the Kazakhstan Chess Federation and has done a lot to promote this activity in his home country.