Amidst President Trump’s apparent pivot toward Russia, Vladmir Putin offered the opportunity for U.S. businesses to re-engage in Russia as one of his primary bargaining chips in peace negotiations, an apparent “concession” to America. Putin will fail at this latest effort just as his imperialistic military plans stalled and his economic puffery has imploded.
“U.S. businesses lost over $300 billion from leaving the Russian market,” deceptively declared Kirill Dmitriev, the head of Russia’s sovereign wealth fund and one of Putin’s lead negotiators, on CNN on Tuesday, referring to the original exit of over 1,000 top companies from Russia in 2022 after Putin’s invasion of Ukraine. “Given such hefty losses, [returning] would be in the interests of the U.S.,” stated Dmitriev.
Those talking points were parroted by the U.S. negotiating team, with Secretary of State Marco Rubio musing about the “incredible opportunities that exist to partner with the Russians economically.”
There’s just one problem: Those “opportunities to partner with the Russians economically” are non-existent, because we know none of the 1,000-plus companies that left are eager to return to Russia or increase their business there.
We know this firsthand, because we helped catalyze the original exodus in 2022. Immediately after Russian’s invasion of Ukraine, its peaceful sovereign neighbor, our team of 50 expert researchers—with mastery in economics, strategy, and global diplomacy, and fluency in 15 languages—in conjunction with a wiki-style network of 200 sources on the ground in Russia and Europe, began publishing a classification of the Russian business status of 1,400 major global firms.
Working 24/7, this effort has been widely credited with catalyzing the largest business exodus in history. We remain, in constant contact with the CEOs of the nation’s largest enterprises, advising them on their Russian responses.
As a general rule, companies seek to invest where there is the rule of law, not the law of rulers. No business wants to invest precious capital into Russia as long as Putin is in power, since they know they could lose the entirety of that investment four years later with the next election, or perhaps even earlier, given the instability of U.S.-Russian relations.
But even more specifically to Russia, and contrary to Dmitriev’s assertions that U.S. companies lost $300 billion by leaving, the Russian market is lilliputian for American businesses, and economically irrelevant. Even prior to leaving, most companies drew no more than 1% of their revenues from Russia; and whatever revenues they lost by leaving Russia were replaced many times over by large, immediate surges in their valuation as reassured investors welcomed relief from the persistent overhang of regulatory, reputational, and nationalization risk unique to operating in Russia.
No shareholders are clamoring for U.S. companies to do business in Russia, just as no CEOs are, and especially now, since as even President Trump has acknowledged, the Russian economy is in freefall with runaway 20% inflation, mass talent flight (over 1 million Russians having fled), capital flight amounting to $250 billion, and rapidly dwindling foreign exchange reserves with every sector hemorrhaging.
The only thing Russia has of any genuine economic value is its deposits of natural resources. Perhaps Trump’s negotiating team has those in mind—but oil wells, gas fields, and metals mines take significant investment to develop, and no American company needs to take the risk of gambling on Putin when the U.S. is already home to some of the world’s largest, undeveloped deposits of energy and rare earth minerals, all of which are ripe for harvesting. As such, Putin needs U.S. investment much more than U.S. companies need Russian natural resources.
No matter what Trump and Putin may say, we are confident none of the 1,000-plus companies that left Russia are excited to return. With few companies willing and able to invest in Russia, the “incredible opportunities that exist to partner with the Russians economically” are as nonexistent as Putin’s credibility. There are genuine concessions to be won from the Russians, but significant opportunities for U.S. business are not among them.
Jeffrey Sonnenfeld is the Lester Crown Professor in Management Practice and Senior Associate Dean at Yale School of Management. Steven Tian is the director of research at the Yale Chief Executive Leadership Institute.
The opinions expressed in Fortune.com commentary pieces are solely the views of their authors and do not necessarily reflect the opinions and beliefs of Fortune.
Read more:
- Trump and Putin teased ‘enormous economic deals’ in their call—but U.S. companies will experience a very different Russia if they return
- European leaders meet in response to Trump’s negotiation with Russia, as U.K. raises possibility of ‘troops on the ground’
- Russia’s ruble is soaring as Trump pushes for an end to the Ukraine war while Europe fears getting sidelined
- An economic catastrophe is lurking beneath Russia’s GDP growth as Putin ‘throws everything into the fireplace’
