Global corporations made almost $214 billion (R3.8trl) through their local Russian businesses in 2022. Now the Kremlin is seizing foreign assets to sell at bargain-bin prices to Putin loyalists.
President Vladimir Putin’s order to seize Danone and Carlsberg’s Russian operations is the fourth expropriation since he signed “Decree 302” on April 25.
On Monday, Putin appointed Yakub Zakriev, Chechnya’s agriculture minister, as head of the Danone business and Taimuraz Bolloyev, a long-time friend of the president, as director of Carlsberg’s Baltika subsidiary.
Last year, the two companies had Russian revenues of $3bn and $1.6bn.
Within a day of signing Decree 302, Putin seized the Russian assets of Finland’s Fortum and Germany’s Uniper, which both operate power plants in Russia.
Data from B4Ukraine and Kyiv School of Economics (KSE) show Philip Morris earning the most revenue, $7.89bn last year, PepsiCo was fourth with $4.66bn, and Danone was ninth at $3bn. Mars ranked 11th with $2.65bn.
According to KSE, of 1 387 Western companies operating in Russia, only 17% - 241 companies - entirely left following the invasion.
Western companies earned $14.1bn in profit last year and paid $3.1bn in tax to the Kremlin’s coffers.
“These companies continue to pay taxes in Russia, indirectly financing the war and the severe breaches of international human rights and humanitarian law that we see in Ukraine today,” write B4Ukraine and KSE.
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