(Bloomberg – bloomberg.com – Ksenia Galouchko – MOSCOW, April 6, 2015) For one of the toughest jobs in financial markets, try predicting the ruble. As Russia’s currency went from the world’s worst performer to the best in the first three months of this year, it caught out even the most accurate forecasters. Oil’s drop to near a six-year low and […]
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(Bloomberg – bloomberg.com – Andrey Biryukov, Anna Andrianova – March 26, 2015) Russia laid out the terms of a draft law to offer amnesty on repatriating capital, promising new incentives and legal protections to aid an economy starved of investment by sanctions over Ukraine. The bill won’t require the return of assets to Russian territory, demanding only their registration in […]
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(Bloomberg – bloomberg.com – Matthew A. Winkler – March 20, 2015) Matthew Winkler, editor-in-chief emeritus of Bloomberg News, writes about markets. [Charts here bloombergview.com/articles/2015-03-20/russia-rebounds-despite-sanctions] Sanctions meant to punish Russia for snatching Crimea from Ukraine one year ago were supposed to hurt Russian business. And they did. Russian stocks, bonds and commodities had the worst performance in 2014 of those in […]
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The Kaluga region, an hour’s drive southwest of Moscow, has become a haven for investors. International giants in industries ranging from automotive to pharmaceutical have built plants, trained and employed thousands of locals, and turned a once-depressed region heavily dependent on federal subsidies into a donor to the national budget. … http://www.themoscowtimes.com/business/article/qa-drawing-foreign-firms-to-russia/517581.html
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(Moscow Times – themoscowtimes.com – Peter Hobson – March 11, 2015) Representative and branch offices of foreign companies working in Russia are in a race against time to re-register with the authorities or lose their license to operate in the country. The re-registration was intended to streamline bureaucracy for foreign firms, but organizational failures and lack of proper warning have […]
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(Business New Europe – bne.eu – Ben Aris in Moscow – March 6, 2015) So far in 2015 Russia has been one of the best performing equity markets, up 15% year-to-date, following three straight weeks of inflows following the Minsk II ceasefire agreement signed in February. So far in 2015 Russia has been one of the best performing equity markets, […]
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(Moscow Times – themoscowtimes.com – Howard Amos – March 3, 2015) Businessmen and investors said Monday that the killing of opposition leader Boris Nemtsov by the walls of the Kremlin last week will further worsen Russia’s battered investment climate and create more uncertainty in a market suffering from Western sanctions and an economic recession. “We are already in a period […]
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(Russia Beyond the Headlines – rbth.ru – Alexei Lossan, RBTH – March 2, 2015) The war in Ukraine is impeding attempts to improve the business climate in Russia, according to the head of the Moscow State University Department of Economics, Alexander Auzan. The Russian authorities therefore have to invest in infrastructure projects in order to overcome the crisis, say analysts. […]
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(Bloomberg – bloomberg.com – Elena Popina – February 26, 2015) Russia is emerging as the world’s best stock market after putting in the worst performance last year. For neighboring Ukraine, the second-biggest loser in 2014, there’s no sign of such a turnaround yet. Russia’s dollar-denominated RTS Index has soared 15 percent in 2015, while the Ukrainian Equities Index is last […]
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(Moscow Times – themoscowtimes.com – Howard Amos – February 20, 2015) Moscow sold a total of $45 billion of U.S. treasury bonds in 2014 as relations with Western governments reached a post-Soviet nadir over the Ukraine crisis. Russia jettisoned $22 billion worth of U.S. treasury bonds in December as the Kremlin scrambled for cash to battle a plunging ruble and […]
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(Business New Europe – bne.eu – PERSPECTIVE: bne IntelliNews – February 16, 2015) [Charts here http://www.bne.eu/content/story/perspective-russias-investment-climate-plummets] A survey into Russia’s investment climate by Moscow-based Detail Communications found that investment confidence has halved since the crisis hit. However, a third of respondents – a mix of portfolio managers and analysts from some of the most prominent investment banks, asset management firms […]
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[“Morgan Stanley thinks Russia’s doomed” – BusinessInsider.com – Elena Holodny – January 30, 2015] Business Insider reports on Morgan Stanley’s pessimistic Russian economic forecast: Morgan Stanley has a short message for Russia: you’re doomed. This past week hasn’t been easy for the Russian economy: … Thursday … EU foreign ministers decided to extend … sanctions on Russia by six months. Additionally, the Central Bank slashed […]
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(Business New Europe – bne.eu – bne IntelliNews – January 27, 2015) Standard & Poor’s downgraded Russia’s credit rating to junk status late on January 26, a move which precipitated the rouble’s fall by more than 6%. S&P lowered Russia’s credit rating to BB+, one step below investment grade, as renewed fighting in Ukraine raised the threat of tighter Western […]
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(US Embassy Moscow – January 20, 2015) Thank you for that introduction, Alex. I am grateful for this opportunity to speak to members of the American Chamber of Commerce in Russia. I am sure you already know them and work closely with them, but let me start by introducing my team. First, there is Deputy Chief of Mission Lynne Tracy […]
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(Business New Europe – bne.eu – COMMENT: Peter Szopo of Erste Asset Management – January 20, 2015) [Charts here http://www.bne.eu/content/story/comment-double-trouble-russia-2014-vs-2008] History, they say, does not repeat itself – it rhymes. Even if this were true, history’s rhymes are clunky at best. While Russia’s current crisis has obvious parallels with the turmoil in 2008, such as the drop in oil prices, […]
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(Russia Beyond the Headlines – rbth.ru – Yekaterina Sinelschikova, RBTH – January 16, 2015) A bill that has passed its first reading the Russian State Duma would give the government the right to fine or ban foreign organizations it deems a security threat. Russia is trying to tighten its control over foreign organizations operating in the country. According to a […]
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(Moscow Times – themoscowtimes.com – Howard Amos – January 15, 2015) Russian officials and experts warned Wednesday that an expected decision by Standard and Poor’s to deprive Russia of its investment-grade credit rating could cost the country up to $30 billion and drain more money from an economy that is already entering recession. Major credit rating agencies Fitch and Standard […]
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(Moscow Times – themoscowtimes.com – Peter Hobson, Alexander Panin – January 12, 2015) Rating agency Fitch on Friday downgraded Russia’s credit rating to one notch above junk status, warning that oil price falls and Western sanctions could contract the country’s economy by 4 percent this year and force the government to pour cash into Russia’s buckling banking system. Coming on […]
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(Russia Beyond the Headlines – rbth.ru – Alexei Lossan, RBTH- December 9, 2014) Russian Prime Minister Dmitry Medvedev has signed an order to sell off 19.5 percent of the shares in Russia’s largest oil company, Rosneft. According to experts, this might help the government generate extra cash amid falling oil prices and Western sanctions. However, this may not be the […]
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(Interfax – December 8, 2014) President Vladimir Putin’s chief of staff has spoken about corruption in Russia. In his remarks, reported by Russian Interfax and TASS news agencies on 8 December, Sergey Ivanov said the Russian government “acknowledged” the problem and had been taking “consistent” steps to deal with it. He dismissed a Transparency International study which ranked Russia 136th […]
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(Business New Europe – bne.eu – bne IntelliNews – December 4, 2014) Russian President Vladimir Putin has announced a complete capital amnesty, allowing businesses to repatriate offshore funds without fear of the consequences. “We need to finally turn the ‘offshore page’ in the history of our economy and country,” Putin told the federal assembly in his annual address. “If someone […]
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(Interfax – November 24, 2014) Russian Investigations Committee has prepared its own proposals allowing to “considerably slow down” the capital flight from Russia, the committee’s head Aleksandr Bastrykin has said, as reported by privately-owned news agency Interfax on 24 November. “We are so wealthy and powerful that we will be able to cope with problems caused by sanctions that are […]
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(Bloomberg – bloomberg.com – Elena Popina – November 24, 2014) As oil fell into a bear market, the ruble traded at record lows and NATO said President Vladimir Putin is stoking conflict in Ukraine, bets on the biggest exchange-traded fund tracking Russian stocks surged to a record. Demand for shares in the Market Vectors Russia ETF has held up as […]
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(Bloomberg – bloomberg.com – Leslie Patton, Ilya Khrennikov – November 19, 2014) McDonald’s Corp.’s (MCD) largest restaurant in Russia reopened after local officials shuttered the location for three months, an optimistic sign for a company trying to return to business as usual in the country. The outlet, situated in Moscow’s Pushkin Square, resumed business today, said Svetlana Polyakova, a spokeswoman […]
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(Moscow Times – themoscowtimes.com – Delphine d’Amora – November 17, 2014) Foreign companies will soon have to seek government permission before buying a more than 25 percent stake in newspapers or magazines in Russia, extending state control in an industry still reeling from legal changes earlier this year, business daily Vedomosti reported late last week. The new amendments, which will […]
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(Business New Europe – bne.eu – CONFERENCE CALL: Ben Aris in Kyiv – October 31, 2014) Two days after a crucial parliamentary election that put the seal on Ukraine’s latest political transformation, SP Advisors, a leading local investment firm, held its first investment conference and invited international investors to Kyiv to debate the Eastern European country’s future. The mood at […]
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Paul Backer, an American attorney based in Moscow, recently has offered the following original contributions to the JRL on the subject of sanctions and the response by business and legal counsel. Backer, pbacker@skalalaw.com, is with Skalaw Law, online at skalalaw.com. Part I: Russia sanctions: implementing client sanctions policies – Sept. 26, 2014 Part II: Russian companies’ failures to adopt effective sanctions policies […]
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(Moscow Times – themoscowtimes.com – Ivan Nechepurenko – October 17, 2014) In 2009, during his stint as prime minister, President Vladimir Putin flirted with being a columnist at literary magazine Russky Pioner, famous for its ostentatious parties. A vehicle for the literary ambition of the Russian elite, its contributors have also included presidential aide Vladislav Surkov and Alfa Group chairman […]
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MOSCOW, October 15 (RIA Novosti) – Russian President Vladimir Putin has signed a law reducing the possible share of foreign stockholders in the Russian media to 20 percent, says the corresponding document published on the Russian government’s official legal information web portal Wednesday. “Unless otherwise stipulated by an international treaty … a Russian legal entity with a foreign participation share […]
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(Interfax – October 15, 2014) Kremlin chief of staff Sergey Ivanov has said that the house arrest of billionaire businessman Vladimir Yevtushenkov is damaging Russia’s investment climate. In an interview with popular pro-Kremlin tabloid Komsomolskaya Pravda, which was quoted by Interfax news agency, Ivanov said that “I agree, this [the arrest of Yevtushenkov] is having a bad influence of the […]
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(Business New Europe – bne.eu – October 14, 2014) On paper, Russian companies have huge foreign debts, and no way of refinancing them because sanctions effectively close Western capital markets to Russian borrowers. But with much of Russian corporate foreign debt in fact hidden equity investments from offshore zones, the figures seem much worse than they are. International headlines are […]
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(Business New Europe – bne.eu – October 14, 2014) Russia and China signed a raft of 40 agreements encompassing trade, energy, finance and technology, following a meeting between Russian prime minister Dmitry Medvedev and his Chinese counterpart, Li Keqiang, on October 14 in Moscow. The agreements demonstrate how Russia is looking for other options, after sanctions imposed on Russia in […]
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(Moscow Times – themoscowtimes.com – October 10, 2014) Kiev’s municipal council has ordered stores in the capital to label Russian-imported goods with additional markings to warn consumers they could be supporting the “aggressor” by buying the products, media reports said. According to the ruling approved by the city’s legislature, Russian made-goods will also have to be displayed on separate shelves […]
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MOSCOW. Oct 9 (Interfax) – Capital outflows from Russia in 2014 could turn out to be less than the official forecast of $100 billion, Economic Development Minister Alexei Ulyukayev believes. “We haven’t changed the forecast for this year. It is still $100 billion. Our accumulated outflow, I believe, is currently $78 billion for eight months and it looks like it […]
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(Moscow Times – themoscowtimes.com – Howard Amos – October 9, 2014) Igor Sechin, the most influential figure in Russia’s energy industry, announced last week that a new oil field discovered in the Arctic was to be christened “Pobeda” – the Russian word for victory. Speaking to reporters from a blustery drilling platform, the Kremlin heavyweight, who also heads state-owned oil […]
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(Business New Europe – bne.eu – Ben Aris – Moscow, October 2, 2014) Leading Russian investment bank VTB Capital held a slimmed-down version of their annual investment conference on October 1-2. The event, “Russia Calling! 6th Annual VTB Capital Investment Forum” at the World Trade Center Moscow didn’t look cut down from the point of view of the number of […]
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(Business New Europe – bne.eu – October 3, 2014) Ukraine’s President Petro Poroshenko reaffirmed to foreign investors that his goal is for Ukraine to ultimately join the European Union, and for this sweeping reforms are necessary. “This involves a significant number of reforms and solving problems. It’s hardly possible to conduct 62 reforms simultaneously, but we have no choice,” Poroshenko […]
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MOSCOW. Oct 2 (Interfax) – Russia has no intention of ending its relations with its traditional partners, including Europe, and expansion of cooperation with China is a global trend, Russian President Vladimir Putin said. “Russia is also thinking about expansion of cooperation with China, and it didn’t begin thinking about it yesterday or due to some sanctions or political restrictions. […]
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(Moscow Times editorial – themoscowtimes.com – September 30, 2014) This story begins a series of analytical articles and editorials in The Moscow Times about Russia’s long-term strategic prospects. It is strange to recall in 2014 that back at the beginning of his rule, President Vladimir Putin was hailed as a reformer. His main agenda during his first term in the […]
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Date: Fri, 26 Sep 2014 From: Paul Backer <contact@skalalaw.com> Subject: Russia sanctions, implementing client sanctions policies Part 1. Russia sanctions, implementing client sanctions policies. Skala Law client update. Sanctions’ impact will worsen through 2015. Failing to understand sanctions’ purpose and enforcement materially and avoidably damages listed and unlisted entities. Lack of a sanctions policy renders entities noncompetitive in tenders and […]
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(Moscow Times – themoscowtimes.com – September 29, 2014) Russia’s law limiting foreign ownership of media in Russia to 20 percent will overturn the country’s media scene. Foreign companies have been at the forefront of developing media in Russia since the early 1990s. They own stakes in hundreds of newspapers, magazines and television stations. Under the law passed by Russia’s parliament […]
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(Moscow Times – themoscowtimes.com – Delphine d’Amora – September 28, 2014) An era in Russian media ended Friday as parliament passed a law limiting foreign ownership in domestic media assets at 20 percent, hitting some of the world’s largest media companies and turning back the clock on an industry that has thrived on foreign brands and capital. Since the draft […]
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(Bloomberg – bloomberg.com – Alan Katz, Jesse Drucker, Irina Reznik – June 25, 2014) To see why U.S. economic sanctions against Russia are likely to have limited impact, follow the spending of a small Delaware-incorporated, Nasdaq-traded television company named CTC Media Inc. (CTCM) While CTC Media has a market capitalization of just $1.7 billion, it’s a good example of the […]
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(Russia Beyond the Headlines – rbth.ru – Alexei Lossan, RBTH – June 26, 2014) Russian ruble has made rapid gains in value against the dollar and euro following statements made by Vladimir Putin. The Russian president declared his support for a peaceful resolution of the Ukrainian crisis after a meeting in Vienna with Austrian President Heinz Fischer, and has also […]
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(Business New Europe – bne.eu – Ben Aris in Moscow – June 25, 2014) Russian stocks hit a five-month high on June 24 after President Vladimir Putin asked Russia’s upper house of parliament to repeal a law that granted him the right to use military force in Ukraine, as investors speculate the standoff with the West over Ukraine’s fate might […]
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(Business New Europe – bne.eu – COMMENT: Peter Szopo of Erste Asset Management – June 18, 2014) [Charts here http://www.bne.eu/content/comment-russian-equities-next-leg-faces-hurdles] The latest Russian stock rally was strong but short. It started in the last week of April and may have ended already in mid-June, as the situation in Ukraine began deteriorating once more. The main RTS index rose by 23% […]
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(Business New Europe – bne.ru – UralSib – June 11, 2014) Our year-end RTS target of 1,520 implies 14% upside. Our yearend RTS target now stands at 1,520, implying 14% upside from the current level. Based on our calculations, the dividend yield for the index is currently 4.3%, which would put the total return at roughly 18%, so we have […]
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(Moscow Times – themoscowtimes.com – Alexander Panin – June 9, 2014) Start-ups, business angels and venture funds – these terms have become part of the Russian language, although just a few years back they were almost completely absent from the local dialect. High-tech business in Russia is expanding rapidly and being part of it is now considered “cool” as thousands […]
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(Russia Beyond the Headlines – rbth.ru – Michael McAtavey, Special to RBTH – June 3, 2014) Russian markets have been pummeled by poor GDP growth and political headwinds. Yet some fund managers say they are finding deals. Sanctions. Conflict in neighboring Ukraine. Sagging economic growth. And let’s not forget capital flight. These are just some of the reasons why Russia’s […]
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(Bloomberg – bloomberg.com – Sandrine Rastello – June 3, 2014) The World Bank approved an investment in Russia for the first time since President Vladimir Putin annexed Crimea, overriding opposition from Canada and lack of support from the U.S. The International Finance Corp., the lender’s private-sector arm, voted May 29 for parts of a 250 million euro ($340 million) package […]
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