Yesterday’s article focused on the oil and gas industry of Russia, today we look at the other sectors of Russia. If a peace agreement is reached and sanctions come off, will businesses rush to Russia?

In an article by Patricia Cohen of the New York Times News Service, there is a thought that businesses will not rush in quickly as Russia has changed in the last 3 years of war with Ukraine.

The country’s war-driven economy is struggling with a 21% interest rate, labor shortages and a shrinking number of middle-class consumers.

According to a database complied by the Yale School of Management, more than 1,000 corporations have left or curtailed operations since the sanctions were imposed.

Agathe Demarais, a senior policy fellow at the European Council on Foreign Relations, said the Russian business environment is extremely difficult, the risk of expropriation is high and the Russian economy is not booming.

The companies that have stayed in Russia don’t fully control their revenues and assets. Companies deemed unfriendly by the Kremlin often had to sell their businesses for pennies on the dollar and pay a 35% surcharge deemed voluntary to the government. Those companies that remained could not legally send profits outside Russia.

Western firms such as Danone, Carlsberg and German state energy company Uniper had their assets seized.

While Russia has great amounts of oil and gas, its trade before the war was 1.7% of the world’s total output.

Most multinationals in Russia earned no more than 1% of their global revenues in there, according to researchers at Yale, but there are always exceptions.

Linking to dividend paying stocks, in every country there is opportunity, the issue is how much profits can be made? There are markets in every country, but there is easy money to be made and harder. It will likely be European companies move forward before American ones when there is peace.

There are more questions than answers, till the next time – to raising questions.