I have to stop with The exclamation points!
From FT Alphaville:
How Russian uncapitalism works
Like a private equity firm enacting an acquisition-led ‘roll-up’ in a fragmented sector, Putin and Co in Russian have been busy in recent years quietly taking scores of small banks into state ownership. In fact, by some estimates, the proportion of banking assets classed as ‘government-controlled’ has jumped from 58 per cent in 2016 to above 70 per cent now....MUCH MORE
Unlike a PE operation, however, Putin’s people -- in this case led by Central Bank of Russia governor Elvira Nabiullina -- are not paying takeover premiums to those ‘selling out.’ In fact, in many cases they are not paying any money at all.
It’s simply a quiet nationalisation of the Russian banking system, seemingly without compensation for those who set up the hundreds of banks established in the 1990s as the country grappled with the then new-fangled concept of market capitalism.
The focus now is the other way round, with the Central Bank of Russia clearly preferring direct management of the sector, rather than the role of supervisor. And, with the oil price under fresh pressure, the bank nationalisation programme may well accelerate from here: last year, following stress tests, the central said that about a quarter of private lenders would be in crisis if the price of a barrel dropped to $25.
So, if that’s how things are playing out, those owners and executives still managing private commercial banks in Russia might look to the British legal system for some guidance on what could be coming their way...…
