By John Helmer in Moscow Prime Minister Vladimir Putin tried sweet-talking the Prime Minister of Qatar, Sheikh Hamad Jabr al-Thani, in Moscow this week on “closer coordination” between the world’s leading exporters of natural and liquefied gas (LNG). At stake are the growing deliveries of shipborne Qatari LNG to European ports, versus the shrinking deliveries […]

by John Helmer - Friday, March 26th, 2010
No Comments »

By John Helmer in Moscow Visits by politicians to banana boats are almost unprecedented outside the tropical climes; no Russian prime minister has ever boarded one before. Almost as rare is it for Prime Minister Vladimir Putin to favour a foreign-owned shipping enterprise when it is competing against a Russian enterprise owned, not only by […]

by John Helmer - Thursday, March 25th, 2010
No Comments »

By John Helmer in Moscow Prime Minister Vladimir Putin, who also chairs the Russian bailout bank Vnesheconombank (VEB), asked Friday for the US Government to signal its support for at least two oligarch-owned Russian companies in the US. The remark, which has taken State Department officials by surprise, mentioned Norilsk Nickel and steelmaker Severstal, whose […]

by John Helmer - Monday, March 22nd, 2010
No Comments »

By John Helmer in Moscow In the first of a worldwide series of trials scheduled against JP Morgan Chase, the US-based banking colossus, a judge of the New South Wales Supreme Court in Sydney decided last week that an attempt by JP Morgan to claim A$50.18 million (dollars are Australian unless noted) in fees was […]

by John Helmer - Sunday, March 21st, 2010
No Comments »

By John Helmer in Moscow Russia’s dominant diamond miner, state-owned Alrosa, has grabbed the crown from De Beers as the world’s largest diamond producer – and most profitable one, too. According to a press release, reporting what was said at the executive board meeting of Alrosa in Mirny, early this week, a draft annual report […]

by John Helmer - Friday, March 19th, 2010
No Comments »

By John Helmer in Moscow The US federal district court judge hearing the multi-billion dollar damage claim by Archangel Diamond Corporation (ADC) against LUKoil has been replaced this week in Colorado, after an ADC shareholder discovered that the judge, Christine Arguello, had once worked for a law firm which has been associated with LUKoil.

by John Helmer - Thursday, March 18th, 2010
No Comments »

We interrupt this news bulletin to bring you a broadcast from Captain Obvious on location live above the Kremlin

by John Helmer - Thursday, March 18th, 2010
No Comments »

By John Helmer in Moscow The chief executive of Russia’s pipeline company Transneft, Nikolay Tokarev (left), has told Deputy Prime Minister Igor Sechin that there is not enough Russian crude oil to make commercially feasible the proposed trans-Balkan pipeline to a new tanker terminal at Alexandroupoli. Tokarev’s opinion, conveyed privately last September, appears to have […]

by John Helmer - Wednesday, March 17th, 2010
No Comments »

By John Helmer in Moscow Banking sources in Moscow are reporting that the sale of the Lucchini assets of the Severstal group, controlled by Alexei Mordashov, is not imminent. According to the sources, a precondition of the transaction is a refinancing or renegotiation of the terms of Lucchini’s current debts, estimated to be about €800 […]

by John Helmer - Tuesday, March 16th, 2010
No Comments »

By John Helmer in Moscow Alrosa has signed a series of three contracts worth a total of $490 million at current diamond values with three Indian cutters, traditionally Alrosa’s largest clients in India. But industry sources in Moscow say they are concerned to find out whether the announcement presages a much larger flow of Russian […]

by John Helmer - Monday, March 15th, 2010
No Comments »