kathi

Move Over Exxon-Mobil, Here Comes Gazprom

Hi Adamnb, I have quite a lot of Surgut too. I bought it for next to nothing in 1998, and continue to hold. It is definitely an underperformer, partly because of their stingy dividends. I've made a ton of money just by holding it, but I hope that someday it is worth more. I didn't mention it above, because I didn't want anyone to think that it is a stock I would highly recommend.

Move Over Exxon-Mobil, Here Comes Gazprom

Hi Objectivity, I haven't posted on the Raging Bull board because I can't get logged in. Plus, my mother in law had cancer for two years, and required daily trips to the hospital, two hours away. (She passed away recently). I have an older computer online now without a lot of the protection that is on my good computer, and I seem to have better luck logging in to sites I couldn't access with the good one. I hope to be able to resume posting in a few months when things settle down here.

I saw your post about Yukos on another Gazprom forum here. Maybe you remember when I was translating Yukos' press releases, and there were so many about their schemes for evading taxes? And how they were paying all of those huge dividends, (most of which went to themselves), as a way to avoid paying their creditors?

Your post about Yukos was right on the money.

Move Over Exxon-Mobil, Here Comes Gazprom

I was lucky. We were only making 18,000 per year in 1998 when the Russian economy crashed. I had been researching Russian companies for a long time, and invested 2,000 at a time when Russian share prices were at the bottom. I reinvest all of my dividends, and my 2,000 dollars is now worth 120,000. This may not sound like much to most people, but to someone on our economic level, it is a nice nest egg for our retirement. (I am 55, and my husband is 58, and we still only earn about 30,000 a year. We also own two houses on the coast of Maine). I watch the news from Russia closely, and have sold some companies to reinvest in others if they looked risky, and always did well that way.

My largest position is in Gazprom, which I originally bought for about 50 cents per share. I also have shares of Norilsk Nickel, Polyus Gold, (got that because Norilsk shareholders got equal shares of Polyus when it was spun off from Norilsk), and LUKoil. I should have bought VIP, but I thought it was expensive compared to the rest of the companies available. I hated Yukos, but bought it cheap, then sold it before it collapsed when it was at the top of it's historical price. I also held Rostelekom for a while, then sold it making a tidy sum, which I reinvested in more Gazprom. I also had Unified Energy Systems, and sold that just before it was carved up, so I could get more Gazprom. When I sold ROS and UES, Gazprom was about $15 per share.

Investing in Russia is rewarding, and if you watch the Russian news closely, it really pays off. US reports on Russia have been very little help to me in deciding when to sell and when to invest.