Russia

It seems everyone has a set of demands for what should happen to Venezuela. For the most part, from the streets of Caracas to the White House, these are loud but rather vague talking points. People in the bond market, though, have begun to put together a plan for reassembling the country’s economy and finances, the Financial Times reported. Of course it would be better if Venezuelans were able to agree their own coherent plan, but that is not happening right now.

Russian conglomerate Sistema has announced it has suffered a technical default on Rbs 3.9bn worth of debt, after a court froze more than $3bn worth of its assets as part of a legal battle with state-controlled oil giant Rosneft. Sistema on Monday announced the technical default, saying that it was “driven exclusively” by the asset freeze, the Financial Times reported.

The delayed $13bn takeover of India’s Essar Oil by a consortium led Rosneft has cleared its last serious obstacles, according to the Russian oil group’s chief executive Igor Sechin. Shareholders at the company’s annual general meeting in Sochi were told on Thursday by Mr Sechin that a “legal decision was received” that would allow the deal to proceed, the Financial Times reported.

VTB, Russia's second-biggest lender, is ready to talk about restructuring Mozambique's debt and has provided all the information required for a forensic audit into hidden loans to three state-owned firm to authorities, a bank's executive said, Reuters reported. The audit of the loans to EMATUM, Proindicus and Mozambique Asset Management (MAM), is a condition for the International Monetary Fund to resume aid talks with one of the world's poorest countries.

Russia's largest bank Sberbank is considering selling 1.1 billion euros (920.1 million pounds) in loans it granted to indebted Croatian food and retail group Agrokor, Sberbank's First Deputy Chairman Maxim Poletayev said, the International New York Times reported on a Reuters story. "We are also considering a possibility of selling Agrokor's debt and are in talks with buyers on the international markets," Poletayev said in an interview with Reuters.

Russia won an early verdict in a London lawsuit that may force Ukraine to repay part of a defaulted $3 billion bond, in a dispute that extended the battle over Russia’s annexation of Crimea into a U.K courtroom, Bloomberg News reported. Judge William Blair threw out all of Ukraine’s arguments Wednesday, saying he was at pains to distinguish between the law and the "troubling" political background. He ruled the case shouldn’t go to a full trial but gave Ukraine the right to appeal.

When Alexei Kudrin was tasked last year with drawing up a new economic strategy for Russia, there were good reasons for the country’s leadership to countenance previously unpalatable reforms, the Financial Times reported. With the crash in oil prices, the effects of sanctions and the fall in the rouble eroding real incomes and squeezing public finances, there was a genuine fear of protest from a middle class accustomed to greater comfort.

Criminal prosecutions have been opened against more than 100,000 businesspeople in Russia in the first half of this year as part of a growing problem that is devastating the Russian economy, an expert on the topic has told a Dublin audience, the Irish Times reported.

Russian state development bank VEB will manage to pay back outstanding debt next year though it will be difficult, the bank's chairman Sergei Gorkov said on Thursday, Reuters reported. Gorkov said VEB had to pay back around 250 billion rubles ($3.9 billion) in outstanding debt next year but Russia's state spending plan envisages only 150 billion rubles for repayment of its debt. "Indeed, it will be tough for us, not an easy task... but we will manage," Gorkov told reporters.

Rosneftegaz, the state holding company that controls Russian oil major Rosneft, is considering helping Rosneft finance the buyback of some of its shares in Rosneft, three sources with knowledge of the discussions said, Reuters reported. The Russian state is preparing to sell a 19.5 percent stake in Rosneft, the biggest Russian oil producer and one of the largest in the world, as part of a privatization scheme intended to plug holes in the budget this year.