Bloomberg spoke to lawyers, bankers, and analysts with experience of working in Russia, to whom in fresh weeks customers have asked questions about what could happen on the Russian market. 1 of them suggested that any companies are already developing "possible scenarios". “The companies carry out comprehensive analyses,” said Chris Weafer, manager of Macro Advisory, a consulting company dealing with strategical consulting for Russia. His company has already received dozens of specified inquiries. — Since Trump's inauguration, Russia's attention has been much greater He noted.
The Russian authorities began to give the impression that Western companies were ready to resume their investment. Vladimir Putin even returned a local company previously taken from Italian Ariston and allowed Goldman Sachs to sale frozen shares of Russian companies worth PLN 87 million (328 million). In March he instructed the government to make the conditions for a possible return of companies, and the Ministry of Finance had already prepared any preliminary proposals, reported Bloomberg. These include, among another things, the request that abroad companies find part of their production in Russia and agree to transfer technology, told agencies 2 government officials.
Not everyone and not everywhere will be allowed in. According to interlocutors, Russian companies will have the right to vote on the admission of foreigners to certain sectors of the market.
Moscow sets the conditions
Putin announced in March that all returning company would gotta guarantee that it operates “in good religion and responsibly”. And Kirił Dmitriev, manager of the Russian Direct Investment Fund (RDIF), who tries to establish contacts with American companies, said that 1 of the conditions of return could be the creation of a joint venture with a Russian partner.
— All fresh investors who want to come to Russia will receive very favourable conditions, but companies who have left the country and would like to take over their erstwhile businesses will gotta pay the full marketplace price for the assets," said Bloomberg Anatoli Aksakov, president of the Financial marketplace Commission of State Duma.
MAXIM SHIPENKOV / PAPKirill Dmitriev and Vladimir Putin, Moscow, Russia, 17 April 2025.
Meanwhile, many companies have given up their assets for almost nothing. For example, Renault donated its shares in AwtoWAZ for 1 ruble and Hyundai Motor donated its shares in 2 factories for $111. any companies were besides forced to sale with a immense discount and even to pay compensation to the budget.
New demands from the Russian authorities call into question the ability of western companies to usage the option of recovering assets lost erstwhile leaving the Russian marketplace after the war launched by Putin. There is besides small hope that this option can be utilized by legal methods. — If you have a conflict with a Russian company and you go to court in Russia now, you lose in 99 percent of cases. — points out Nabi Abdullaiev, a partner at the London Control Risks consulting company.
“No 1 knocks on the door yet”
However, most companies will not consider returning until a lasting agreement is reached to end the war in Ukraine. — Nobody wants to come back besides shortly and then leave again. “Weafer says.
— No 1 has yet knocked on the door, as Bloomberg admitted. Deputy Finance Minister Ivan Czebeskov said in April that his ministry did not receive any offers from abroad companies.
One of the high-ranking managers in the natural materials sector said the “Financial Times” that representatives of major global natural materials trading companies were late seen in Moscow at breakfast and lunch with employees of large Russian companies in the industry. According to him, there were besides representatives of investment banks in the Russian capital. However, neither he nor the another experts with whom the diary has spoken are expecting an influx of abroad investments to Russia or the return of American listed companies.
Sometimes a glimpse of hope gives emergence to any actions of abroad companies, which can be received as preparations for return. specified speculation in the Russian press sparked the re-registration of Toyota Motor brands at the beginning of this year, during which models were besides added which had not previously been sold in that country. Law in Russia requires renewal of registration all 3 years. In consequence to Bloomberg's request, the nipponese company called specified an action a "routine case", which "has nothing to do with anything but the continued protection of the intellectual property of global brands."
The risk-benefit ratio changed radically compared to the “astronomic” gains that could have been achieved in Russia in the 1990s and 2000s by Charles Hecker, author of the book “Zero Sum”, devoted to the influx of global business to post-Soviet Russia, told Bloomberg: “ I don't think any company can now anticipate to find the mountains of gold that have been waiting for it in erstwhile decades..
— Russian officials wanted to make the impression that everything was going smoothly and virtually everything was going to be the way it was. In fact, the situation is completely different," said “FT” Steven Daszewski, investment manager at the London company D&P Advisors, who in the past worked in Russia at Aton, Unicredit Securities and its own investment fund.
