Posted on 11/26/2014 3:16:43 PM PST by Tailgunner Joe
He is Dmitry Firtash, a former fireman and soldier. In little more than a decade, the Ukrainian went from obscurity to wealth and renown, largely by buying gas from Russia and selling it in his home country. His success was built on remarkable sweetheart deals brokered by associates of Russian leader Vladimir Putin, at immense cost to Russian taxpayers, a Reuters investigation shows.
Russian government records reviewed for this article reveal for the first time the terms of recent deals between Firtash and Russia's Gazprom, a giant gas company majority owned by the state.
According to Russian customs documents detailing the trades, Gazprom sold more than 20 billion cubic metres of gas well below market prices to Firtash over the past four years – about four times more than the Russian government has publicly acknowledged. The price Firtash paid was so low, Reuters calculates, that companies he controlled made more than $3 billion on the arrangement.
Over the same time period, other documents show, bankers close to Putin granted Firtash credit lines of up to $11 billion. That credit helped Firtash, who backed pro-Russian Viktor Yanukovich's successful 2010 bid to become Ukraine's president, to buy a dominant position in the country's chemical and fertiliser industry and expand his influence. ....
According to a U.S. indictment unsealed in April, he is suspected of a scheme to bribe Indian government officials to procure titanium. Two U.S. government officials said the American investigation into Firtash is continuing; they declined to give further details.
The Ukrainian oligarch has said the allegations are "without foundation" and has accused Washington of acting for "purely political reasons." He has hired an all-star legal defence team. It includes Lanny Davis, who helped President Bill Clinton weather a series of White House scandals in the 1990s.
(Excerpt) Read more at in.reuters.com ...
Luckily that doesn’t happen here. Solyndra.
I guess Putin loves “his” country about as much as Obama loves the USA.
He is likely a KGB/FSB agent. Russia’s economy is built around these “sweet” deals for KGB/FSB goons who, under the guise of being independent oligarchs, actually safeguard the wealth of the underground soviet structures and use their money for the purposes of the regime. Much of the Communist Party’s money was saved/transformed in this way, by transferring it out of party coffers and into “private” hands, both within and mostly outside the country, but these same privateers walk a very fine line and must obey a large number of invisible rules in order to stay alive or to retain their positions. Those who break the rules are quickly dispossessed by the state of their wealth (and maybe their lives), which secretly belongs to the state, which is either directly reabsorbed into the government or divided up amongst other or new stooges.
It is important to understand that in Russia, everything is weaponized. Information is a weapon. The media is a weapon. How they invest their money is also a weapon.
“I guess Putin loves “his” country about as much as Obama loves the USA.”
I wouldn’t put Putin at such a low level.
Why not? Because Putin, at least, was a strong-arm thug, while Obama is more whimpy? They are both still agents of international communism. Obama's various mentors were all deeply tied with the Communist party and thus the KGB. Putin was actually a member of the KGB.
My thoughts exactly....
How do you say “kickbacks” in Ukrainian? Oh, it’s “KICKBACKSKI”.
“Luckily that doesn’t happen here. Solyndra”
Yep....
Biden’s Son Gets Ukrainian Oil Company Gig
http://abcnews.go.com/blogs/politics/2014/05/bidens-son-gets-ukrainian-oil-company-gig/
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