It was a pleasant and unexpected surprise. On May 30 in a
boardroom showdown between president Vladimir Putin and Rem
Vyakhirev, the chief executive officer of Gazprom - Russia's gas
monopoly and what the Russian press likes to call a
state-within-the-state - Putin ousted what one investor calls "one
of the more encrusted of Russia's vested interests".
"It was not just a fundamental victory, but a symbolic one," says
Dmitry Abdayev, an oil and gas analyst with United Financial Group,
a Moscow brokerage. "It shows that the government is not going to
tolerate the corporate governance abuses in Russia's big companies
any more."
Investors welcomed what they are calling a "landmark decision", A
change at the top of Gazprom is more than welcome. Although Putin
has been pushing through numerous reform measures this year, they
have mainly dealt with such nuts-and-bolts issues as deregulation
and the customs code. Reforming Russia's powerful natural
monopolies got...
