#5
Madly in Love (Vedomosti)
Americans are dreaming about Russian securities
by Leonid Bershidsky
issued on 05.11.01
www.therussianissues.com
On the first day of the Harvard University and Dow Jones Russian investment symposium in Boston, U.S. Secretary of Commerce Donald Evans told touching stories about his recently friendship with his Russian counterpart German Gref. It so happened that Mr. Evans set the general tone for one of the main Russian high business society social events: unexpectedly, they spoke quite a bit about friendship and, predictably, about money.
U.S. representatives (and they made up more than half of the symposium's 400 participants) said some incredible things. For example, Ronald Freeman, the head of Lipper & Co. International, frankly stated, "I hope that next time we're here, we'll have accounts in Troika Dialog (a well-known Russian investment company) and YUKOS (one of the biggest oil producers in Russia) and that this will mean that our old age will be secure and our children will get a decent education." Mr. Freeman's company has suffered some serious losses on the American market recently; he said the company would have received a $500 profit for every $1000 had they invested in Russia this year.
His position seems to be well grounded: where else is there economic growth now? Russia's 1998 crisis is long forgotten. The U.S., Japan and some European countries that used to be habitual investment markets for the Americans are struggling to overcome their own financial crisis at the moment. U.S. businessmen themselves admit that they could certainly use Russian knowledge in dealing with the current situation on the U.S. financial market. Mark Tulewsky, the author of the book about American investments into the Russian market, Overcoming Obstacles, said that the Russian experience "is a very topical issue for the U.S."
Unlike the last year's Boston symposium, which Russian officials remember as a complete flop, this year everybody is praising Vladimir Putin and German Gref is considered to be a hero. "Some promises that the Russian government made last year seemed to be unrealistic," John Reppert, a Harvard professor, said. "Now it is clear that Putin and his team keep their promises. Their economic growth has turned out to be stable."
A lot changed in the American attitude towards Russia after the tragic events on September 11th. It was mentioned several times during the symposium that after the attacks on New York and Washington D.C. Putin immediately cancelled Russia's military training in the Far East in order not to distract American intelligence services from their investigation of the terrorist acts. Nothing like that has ever happened before.
Not only the U.S. has changed their opinion about Russia. Europe also views Russian in a different light now. "It was not Russia that changed, it was our attitude towards what is currently happening in that country," the president of the European Bank of Reconstruction and Development, Jean Lemierre, said.
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