Emerging Markets, Emerging Russia, Emerging Views
From the monthly archives:
By Ivan Anderzhanov in Moscow
The $453bn Norwegian sovereign wealth fund has dumped its stake in Russian miner Norilsk Nickel on the grounds it has breached the fund’s environmental guidelines.
The fund’s ethical group said in a report said it was likely Norilsk’s operations are causing damage that will have effects “far into the future.”
The decision was [...]
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By Ivan Anderzhanov in Moscow
Russian state savings giant Sberbank has hired Sergey Borovikov to head its new private banking unit.
According to a report in today’s RBC Daily, Sberbank have hired the head of Alfa Bank’s VIP private client operation to develop its own private banking and wealth management operation.
Borovikov told the newspaper [...]
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By Jason Corcoran in Moscow
The Moscow Prosecutor Office has rejected a request for an independent medical examination into the death of the Hermitage Capital’s lawyer Sergey Magnitsky.
His mother had made a request for an independent examination after Magnitsky had died in custody on Monday November 16 after complaining for weeks that he was denied [...]
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By James Beadle, Global & Emerging Market Strategist, Market-Melange.com
Russia’s under-performance relative to its BRIC peers is justified and well-explained. Yet, it also creates upside potential. Russia is beginning a new development phase, which creates opportunity and makes it an attractive buy for 2010.
The potential for decisive progress is limited and many systematic problems will remain. [...]
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By Ivan Anderzhanov in Moscow
Belgian financial group KBC Group is looking to sell Absolut Bank only two years after acquiring its key Russian asset for $1bn.
Analysts suggested that the most likely buyer would be another foreign group keen to gain access to the Russian banking sector.
KBC needs to slash the size of its business by [...]
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By Ivan Anderzhanov in Moscow
Renaissance Capital today announced the appointment of a senior politician Igor Kamenskoy as chairman of the board.
A long-serving member of the Federation Council, Russia’s upper house of Parliament, Kamenskoy will oversee Renaissance’s relationships with Russian government agencies and regulators as well as state corporations.
Kamenskoy’s appointment will become effective immediately following his [...]
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By Jason Corcoran in Moscow
The London Stock Exchange believes dual Russian stock listings in Moscow and London will endure in spite of plans to curb the amount firms can sell overseas.
The new rules, which are due to come into force from January 1, aim to restrict domestic companies from running to foreign exchanges by retaining [...]
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By Ivan Anderzhanov in Moscow
Russian oil industry services firm Eurasia Drilling yesterday annouced it had cancelled plans to place Global Depositary Receipts (GDRs) after bids failed to match its expectations.
Investment bankers at JP Morgan and Alfa Bank will lose out having been mandated as joint bookrunners. JP Morgan was also the sole global coordinator for [...]
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By Jason Corcoran in Moscow
A lawyer jailed on charges of helping William Browder’s Hermitage Capital Management evade taxes has died in a Moscow detention centre’s hospital.
Sergey Magnitskiy, 37, died yesterday at 9.50pm in Matrosskaya Tishina pre-trial detention centre in Moscow of apparent toxic shock and heart failure.
Magnitsky, a 37-year-old partner at Moscow law firm [...]
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By Ivan Anderzhanov in Moscow
Herbert Moos has taken up his new duties as chief financial officer of VTB and deputy chief executive.
A VTB official confirmed the report, according to the press service Interfax.
Moos takes over from Nikolai Tsekhomsky, who quit in September after four years in the job to take up a senior role leading [...]
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Rustam Botashev, Senior Analyst at Unicredit Securities.
The Central Bank of Russia is to toughen requirements for banks participating in uncollateralised auctions from February 1 2010, the regulator reports. We see the move as evidence that short-term liquidity is no longer a problem for banks, and that the Russian banking system no longer needs a substantial [...]
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By Ivan Anderzhanov in Moscow
Investment bank Renaissance Capital has notched up its 14th deal in Africa this year after advising the Central African Mining and Exploration Co. (CAMEC) following its acquisition by ENRC, an LSE-listed Kazakh mining group.
The $955m deal in the mining sector is the largest public transaction on which Renaissance has advised [...]
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