Leo Wainstein (4 January 1883 – 13 March 1978) was a Ukrainian Jewish jurist and businessman who lived most part of his life in Finland.
He graduated as a jurist in Odessa University in 1910 and worked in the field until 1916 when he got involved in the wool business through his marriage to Regina née Tilling.
[1] Wainstein's wool business came to end after the October Revolution and at late 1918 the couple decided to move to newly independent Finland.
[1] In 1924 Waintein took over Turun Verkatehdas Oy (Turku Baize Factory) from young businessman Wilhelm Wahlforss, who had led the company unsuccessfully.
PYP continued funding the Turku baize factory partly because of Wainstein's good relationship to the bank's main director Rainer von Fieandt, and partly because the company collapse would have meant a victory to another local competitor Barker-Littoinen Oy and its financier and Kansallis-Osake-Pankki (KOP), which was the main competitor of PYP.
[1] Since the 1920s Wainstein had been involved in hatmaking, being a board member of Oy Silfverbergin & Wecksellin Yhdistetyt Hattutehtaat ("Silfverberg's & Wecksell's United Hat Factories Ltd").
After leaving baize manufacturing, Wainstein got involved into Kristinestad located hat producer Oy M. Kotschack Ab together with his son Michael.
The foundation had a significant amount of capital and it shared grants and funded a number of pieces of sculpture in Turku, Helsinki and Gothenburg.