Putin Allows Goldman Sachs to Sell Russian Oil, Gas Shares (2025)

(Bloomberg) — President Vladimir Putin is permitting Goldman Sachs International to sell shares of Russia’s largest energy producers and some other companies, in a deal currently worth around $87 million, according to an order published Wednesday.

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The presidential measure allows the US firm to sell the stocks to Armenia-based Balchug Capital, which in turn can sell them on the market, it said. The deals don’t require additional permission from Russian authorities.

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A spokesman for Goldman Sachs declined to comment.

The list of the stocks that Goldman Sachs can sell under the order includes shares of Russia’s major oil producers Rosneft PJSC, Lukoil PJSC and Surgutneftegas PJSC, as well as gas companies Gazprom PJSC and Novatek PJSC, and utility company Inter RAO UES PJSC. Based on the current price of the shares, the total value of the deal may reach around $87 million, according to Bloomberg calculations.

In late January, Putin also allowed Goldman Sachs to sell its subsidiary in Russia to Balchug Capital.

Russia blocked funds and securities held by non-residents from countries it considered “unfriendly” in C accounts soon after the war began in February 2022. Those accounts contained more than 500 billion rubles ($6.4 billion at the time) as of the start of March 2023, according to the Bank of Russia. The central bank stopped disclosing those amounts, but payments of dividends, coupons, and the debt on bonds have been gradually accumulating on the accounts.

Putin last month allowed some international funds to sell Russian securities, a move that came as relations between Russia and the US have started to improve with the return of Donald Trump to the White House.

Balchug Capital is run by David Amaryan, a hedge fund manager, who has been buying up real estate assets in Russia since the start of the war in Ukraine. He previously worked at AllianceBernstein Holding LP, Citigroup Inc. and the Moscow-based investment bank Troika Dialog.

—With assistance from Jenny Surane.

(Updates with a table, background in the fifth paragraph, details of earlier permissions in the sixth and seventh paragraphs)

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