Peter Westin launches In from the Cold: the rise of Russian capitalism

BSR Russia

Russia’s transformation from central planning to a market-based economy over the past 20 years must rank as one of the biggest economic stories of our time, according to a new book on the rise of Russian capitalism. launched in London by its editor, Peter Westin, Chief Equity Strategist and Economist for ATON, Russia’s oldest independent investment group.

Like the editor, many of the contributors to this book have lived and worked in Russia for much of the past 20 years, not only bearing witness to that country’s remarkable economic transformation but participating in the dynamic capital markets that sprang from almost nothing.

The authors – all economic and finance professionals who have invested in the nuts and bolts of the Russian transformation – demonstrate why the positive economic achievements of the last 20 years should be more widely recognized in the West.

For example, the Russian government has been far more fiscally prudent than many Western countries, taking advantage of high oil prices to create a fiscal fund that by the end of 2008 held a combined $225bn, much strengthening the nation’s public finances.

And, the authors note, while the US provided the capitalist model, it is China that will soon be Russia’s largest trading partner – and together these two economies may grow to dominate the twenty-first century.

At the same time, the authors caution that Russia’s economic outlook is far from secure, especially as it remains alarmingly dependent on the oil price and further progress is stymied by systemic corruption.
Contributors are Ben Aris, Rebecca Baldridge, Fred Berliner, Arnab Das, Steven Dashevsky, Peter Elam Hakansson, Johan Elmquist, Natalia Gurushina, Peter M. Halloran, Andrew Risk, Andrey Shemetov, Bernie Sucher and Mattias Westman.

I particularly enjoyed Ben Aris’ account of being being thrown out of a Yukos shareholder meeting at gunpoint, but the closing chapter written by Bernie Sucher offers thought-provoking insight into how business is the active participant in building a better country although Bernie highlights cases of where the business community has failed to support its champions, turning their backs on Hermitage Capital’s Bill Browder and shrugging at the apparent false arrest and murder in jail of the young lawyer Sergei Magnitsky. срочный займ на карту онлайн онлайн займы zp-pdl.com https://zp-pdl.com срочный займ на карту