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Strategies & Market Trends : 2026 TeoTwawKi ... 2032 Darkest Interregnum -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: Haim R. Branisteanu who wrote (126396)	12/17/2016 3:53:31 PM
From: James Seagrove	1 Recommendation Recommended By Haim R. Branisteanu Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 217557

Untold tragedy happened in those Eastern European countries. Criminal behaviour was rampant both public and private.

To: Haim R. Branisteanu who wrote (126396)	12/17/2016 4:30:01 PM
From: Elroy Jetson	Respond to of 217557

75% of the Russian people disapproves of the privatization of the Russian economy which took place during the 1990s, according to Russia's Higher School of economics. But there was nothing lacking in the legal and other advisors sent to Russia. They established the new rule of law and the IMF stabilized the value of the Ruble. Most businesses were privatized to their employees with 70% of the Russian economy in private hands by 1995. But this excluded the natural resource companies such as oil and nickel. In 1996 Boris Yeltsin, informed by the kleptocracy in the Parliament, sought to close a government budget deficit with a horrifically corrupt scheme - "Shares for Loans" whereby the government would hand over shares in Russia's natural resource firms to Russians who were able and willing to "lend" the Yeltsin government money. The "Shares for Loans" program effectively sold much of Russia's oil and other natural resource companies in return for prices far below market value. Yeltsin had the same impaired judgement common to all alcoholics. What recent former communist citizens had hundreds of millions to "lend" to the Yeltsin government? 1.) Organized crime figures of "Thieves World" who smuggled drugs and sold protection had this much money. Some Oligarchs fronted for them, others "borrowed money" from crime gangs; 2.) Some would-be oligarchs took a more conventional route and partnered with foreign investors. This option was greatly encouraged by the west, but Option 1 was preferable to Yeltsin to avoid looking like he was selling all of the nation's assets to foreigners. Oligarchs with money borrowed from foreigners or Russian criminals turned to the former KGB/FSB security officers in return for money and later shares in the business, to provide them with security from competing Russian criminal gangs, or their criminal lenders / partners. Russia quickly became the "Wild West" with shoot-outs in the street and businessmen routinely killed by car bombs. No businessman could not operate without a connection to the government security officers or one of the criminal gangs along with two security vehicles filled with men with guns. If you opened a business you'd need protection from one of the gangs who might also be powerful enough to protect you from the government. My Mom's cousin who had for decades run a trading firm selling medical equipment to the Soviet Union closed his business there saying it was now dangerous beyond reason. The outcome of this catastrophe was a show-down between State Security forces and former State Security Forces suppressing organized crime and effectively seizing their assets by demanding exclusive loyalty from the Oligarch. As the criminal gangs were squeezed out, Putin then introduced his new style of government-private "ownership" of the natural resource part of the economy. Manager/Owners would be entitled to world-class pay and perks in return for "sitting on the egg" but they had to understand they didn't actually own the egg themselves - that still belonged to the State. Russians agreed with this overwhelmingly because these businesses had been effectively stolen at knock-down prices by criminals under Yeltsin's "Loans for Shares" programs. Foreigners who funded acquisition of state-owned oil companies like BP were likewise informed they were egg sitters rather than owners. After a long fight BP realized they could do nothing but go along. The opinion of my family member who long traded with the Soviet government believes "Russia went from bad to absolutely horrible and they've now managed to clay their way back to merely bad."