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The Skolkovo
Moscow School of Management was launched September 21, 2006 and
the Graduate School of Management of
the Saint Petersburg State University on November 29, 2006. Both
inauguration ceremonies (laying the ground bricks) were absolutely
identical and attended by President Putin. It is easy to guess that
each of the project is supported by the two (supposed to be)
successors of the President – Dmitry
Medvedyev and Sergey
Ivanov.
Both schools seem to target the same goal, but the essential
difference is that Skolkovo is built from scratch
and is targeted to focus on developing markets, and the Graduate
School of Management of the Saint Petersburg State University
is based on the management department within the university. And of
course the locations and sites are different – in Moscow the
campus will be built from scratch in the suburb of the city, and in
St.Petersburg at the restored Mikhailovskaya Dacha. The
oligarchs that sponsor these two projects are different.
The other difference is that Skolkovo project is the product of
deliberate planning by Ruben
Vardanian, chairman and chief executive of Troika Dialog
investment bank. Mr. Vardanian did an exceptionally tough job
examining 18 world business schools and drafting the plan for his
own effort. He has persuaded 12 Russian business oligarchs and two
non-Russian investors each to stump up $5 million to finance the
school, including Roman Abramovich. Aside from Abramovich, others
include Rustam Tariko, the vodka and banking oligarch, steel magnate
Alexei Mordashov, and Viktor Vekselberg. The
list is really impressive, but equally impressive is the list
of International Advisory Board that is headed by Dmitry
Medvedev, the first Deputy Chairman of the Russian Government. And
Patricia M. Cloherty, Chairman and CEO of Delta
Private Equity Partners, LLC, manager of the U.S. Russia
Investment Fund and Delta Russia Fund, L.P. is also there.
Investing: Russia's bond
market: It's the final frontier
 Published:
November 17, 2006
MOSCOW: Russian manufacturers, construction companies and
retailers are selling a record amount of bonds, enticing investors
with yields as high as 10 percent.
Don-Stroy Group, the builder of Triumph Palace in Moscow, the
tallest European apartment building, the sugar producer Prodimex
Group and the ball-bearing maker European Bearing are among about 20
companies that have privately sold more than $3 billion this year,
up from $2.6 billion in all of 2005, according to data compiled by
MDM-Bank in Moscow.
The three companies, which have no credit ratings and do not meet
global accounting standards, lured investors with bonds that pay at
least three percentage points more in annual interest than the
Russian state- controlled natural gas monopoly Gazprom. They also
yield more than twice the 4.2 percent average on European
investment-grade securities, according to Merrill Lynch indexes.
"It's the final frontier for emerging- market
specialists," said Peter Harvey, head of credit at Cazenove
Capital Management in London.
The Russian corporate bonds have helped increase returns as a
decline in defaults drove down yield premiums in the United States,
Europe and Asia. The extra yield, or spread, for company bonds over
U.S. Treasury notes narrowed to about 1.1 percentage points this
year, from an average 1.62 percentage points in the previous five
years, according to a Merrill Lynch index of investment-grade and
non-investment grade securities.
Investment in Russia by year end
to grow 12.7% on 2005 - ministry
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MOSCOW, October 23 (RIA Novosti) - Investment in Russia by the
end of the year is expected to grow 12.7% on 2005, the economic
development and trade minister said Monday.
The investment climate in Russia is gradually improving, with
more and more foreign companies emerging on the Russian market.
According to the global management consulting firm AT Kearney,
Russia rose to sixth place in the FDI (Foreign Direct Investment)
Confidence Index 2005, after China, the United States, Britain,
India and Poland (in March 2005, Russia was ranked 11th).
German Gref said investment in Russia rose 11.7% in the first
nine months of 2006, and 15% in September.
According to Russia's Finance Ministry, foreign and domestic
capital investment in Russia in 2005 totaled $121 billion.
Gref highlighted the upward trend in the retail trade sector,
which saw a 13.5% growth in the reporting period.
Putin says private capital inflow
in Russia hit $27 bln in 2006
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MOSCOW, October 6 (RIA Novosti) - Foreign private capital
inflow into Russia reached $27 billion during the first nine
months of 2006, President Vladimir Putin said Friday.
"I talked with the chairman of the Central Bank yesterday,
and [he said] we are registering a large inflow of foreign
currency, private capital, which according to estimates, totaled
$27 billion in the first nine months [of 2006]," Putin said
during a meeting with Finance Minister Alexei Kudrin.
Kudrin said that the current inflow had been reflected in
direct investments, which had also increased this year by $2.7 bln
from $18.1 bln in 2005 to $20.8 bln in 2006. In terms of direct
investment, Russia has outpaced Japan, Canada and other leading
countries in 2006, the minister said.
"This shows that the economy, industrial enterprises are
being modernized, but our objective is to direct the growing
currency inflow into manufacturing and the government is currently
working on this," Kudrin said.
The minister said Russia must develop financial institutions
strictly regulating the money supply in the country to slow down
inflation and stabilize currency exchange rates.
Kudrin said in August that Russia's government would use
economic measures to hold back the ruble's further rise, and
intends to keep the national currency's appreciation within 4.7%
of its average effective rate this year.
Gazprom fuels surge in Moscow stock exchange
Russian market rose 80 per cent in 2005; about 25 new companies will list this year
By LUCIE GODEAU
Monday, January 16, 2006 Page
B6
Agence France-Presse
MOSCOW
-- Moscow's stock exchange is beating record after record in the
early days of 2006, fired up by Russian state-run gas giant OAO
Gazprom whose skyrocketing share price has already made it one
of the top 10 most highly-valued companies in the world.
The Moscow market, whose roller-coaster rides demand a strong
heart from investors, was up by 80 per cent in 2005.
And the memory of the OAO Yukos affair, which the previous year
plunged the former Russian No. 1 oil producer's stock into the abyss
and limited gains on the Moscow exchange to 8 per cent in 2004, is
now gone.
Yukos's founder Mikhail Khodorkovsky was jailed after being
convicted of several criminal charges.
In 2005, the Russian stock exchange saw a "record
high," largely thanks to Gazprom and the savings bank Sberbank,
both firms controlled by the state, Russia's Economic Development
Minister German Gref said last week.
He pointed out that Gazprom stock rose in value by 176 per cent
last year and Sberbank's by 162 per cent.
By comparison, developing countries have seen their stock
exchange markets up by an average 30 per cent in 2005, and the New
York Stock Exchange by 5 per cent.
Deputy prime minister Dmitry Medvedev announced last Thursday
that Gazprom's capitalization now topped $200-billion (U.S.), after
its share price shot up by more than 20 per cent since the start of
this year when the government lifted the "ring fence"
prohibiting investment from abroad in the firm.
This liberalization measure, which President Vladimir Putin
promised to investors since the launch of his first mandate, allows
foreigners to acquire ordinary Gazprom shares on the dollar-based
RTS stock exchange, the Moscow bourse of reference for foreign
investors.
"Over the past decade, there was an absurd system separating
Gazprom shares into two categories -- ordinary ones quoted at St.
Petersburg and those reserved for foreigners known as ADR's, the
less interesting ones," said Christopher Granville, chief
strategist for the UFG investment firm.
Ahead of this small revolution, Gazprom ADR shares quoted in
London jumped up by 8.7 per cent Thursday, putting the value of the
world's No. 1 gas company at $217-billion, just behind oil producer Royal
Dutch Shell PLC.
"Investors are very excited" concerning Gazprom stock,
observed Mr. Granville who said he expected Gazprom's
capitalization, which had tripled since the summer of 2005, to
"rise even higher."
The gas dispute between Gazprom and Ukraine, far from scaring
investors, rather provided a stark demonstration of the company's
might, analysts in Moscow said.
Away from the Gazprom spotlight, the Russian market as a whole is
proving highly attractive to international investors due to the
strong performance of the country's economy where natural resources
still hold pride of place.
"With Gazprom propelled to its real value . . . a series of
new introductions to the exchange, a local market of booming capital
and oil companies once again having the wind in their sails, 2006
should be a fascinating year," said Roland Nash, a strategist
for Renaissance Capital.
No less than 25 Russian companies are to enter the stock exchange
this year and are forecast to raise capital worth about $16-billion.
Nevertheless, though investor concerns over Russia's political
and economic course seem allayed, one should not forget the Russian
economy "is even more dependent on gas and oil than when
President Putin came to power" in 2000, said Christopher Weafer,
an analyst for Alfa Bank.
The Moscow market is as a result more vulnerable than ever to an
economic downturn.
Copyright(c) 2004 AMROS Corporation. All rights reserved
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