Russia's merger wave

["Marvin Gandall" <marvin.gandall@xxxxxxxxxxxx>]

Today's  Financial Times reports on a new stage in the development of
Russian capitalism – the consolidation of key industries and their opening
to foreign takeover for the first time since the Bolshevik Revolution.

The first generation of buccaneering Russian capitalists like Mikhail
Khodorkovsky, Roman Abramovich, and Anatoly Chubais grabbed the lion’s share
of the privatized Soviet economy in a ruthless free-for-all in the 1990’s
and jealously guarded their budding empires from foreign takeover. Now, the
Times says, they are looking for foreign partners because some want to sell
their stakes, while others seek Western involvement to shield them from the
stepped-up state intervention of the Putin government while simultaneously
boosting the value of their holdings.

Russia’s oil and aluminium industries are in the forefront of this trend –
the most notable example being Yukos, Russia’s largest oil company, which
acquired rival Sibneft and is now negotiating to sell a significant slice of
the merged company to Western oil giants ChevronTexaco and ExxonMobil.

Sub-only FT article reproduced on www.supportingfacts.com.



~~~~~~~
PLEASE clip all extraneous text before replying to a message.