Published: June 2 2007 03:00 | Last updated: June 2 2007 03:00
When it comes to energy in Russia, timing is everything. In 1912, the Rothschilds swapped their Russian oil assets for big shareholdings in Royal Dutch and Shell. Five years later, during the revolution, the Nobel family fled and sold their one-third share of the country’s oil output for a derisory sum.
Moscow yesterday deferred its decision on the Kovykta gas field but BP’s joint venture, TNK-BP, is still widely expected to lose its permit within weeks. Last December, Royal Dutch Shell lost control of its Sakhalin project to Gazprom. Yet some investors remain sanguine. Shell received a 25 per cent premium to its capital invested, and TNK-BP might recover the $500m it sank in Kovykta. Foreigners, it is argued, are still welcome as minority partners.
Given that BP and Shell have investments in Russia worth more than $20bn, this view may end up looking incredibly complacent. As the historian Daniel Yergin has noted, oil nationalisations are usually creeping seizures. In 1974, Saudi Arabia took 60 per cent of Aramco – by 1976 it insisted on 100 per cent. In 1971, Venezuela committed to maintain foreign concessions until 1983. A year later it moved towards full control.
Nor is it self-evident that the Kremlin will only manipulate the energy sector. Telephony, where European companies have up to $15bn of exposure, could be viewed as “strategic” too – Venezuela has just renationalised its main operator. Russian bond and equity valuations suggest political risk is moderate, but such measures may be unreliable given that the state owns or controls a big chunk of both asset classes.
Forecasting in Russia is tricky – in 1920 the chairman of Royal Dutch predicted the “Bolsheviks will be cleared . . out of the whole of Russia in about six months”. But with an election of sorts imminent and the state and its proxies flush with cash, foreigners with illiquid investments should at least be debating whether selling out beats clinging on.
Copyright The Financial Times Limited 2007
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Royal Dutch Shell conspired directly with Hitler, financed the Nazi Party, was anti-Semitic and sold out its own Dutch Jewish employees to the Nazis. Shell had a close relationship with the Nazis during and after the reign of Sir Henri Deterding, an ardent Nazi, and the founder and decades long leader of the Royal Dutch Shell Group. His burial ceremony, which had all the trappings of a state funeral, was held at his private estate in Mecklenburg, Germany. The spectacle (photographs below) included a funeral procession led by a horse drawn funeral hearse with senior Nazis officials and senior Royal Dutch Shell directors in attendance, Nazi salutes at the graveside, swastika banners on display and wreaths and personal tributes from Adolf Hitler and Reichsmarschall, Hermann Goring. Deterding was an honored associate and supporter of Hitler and a personal friend of Goring.
Deterding was the guest of Hitler during a four day summit meeting at Berchtesgaden. Sir Henri and Hitler both had ambitions on Russian oil fields. Only an honored personal guest would be rewarded with a private four day meeting at Hitler’s mountain top retreat.
IN JULY 2007, MR BILL CAMPBELL (ABOVE, A RETIRED GROUP AUDITOR OF SHELL INTERNATIONAL SENT AN EMAIL TO EVERY UK MP AND MEMBER OF THE HOUSE OF LORDS: 
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A head-cut image of Alfred Donovan (now deceased) appears courtesy of The Wall Street Journal.
