Russian Executives Urge Putin for Action Against Rising State Asset Seizures

Russian business executives have reached out to President Vladimir Putin to intervene in a surge of government asset confiscations impacting factories, ports, and large corporations valued at over 4 trillion rubles (approximately $43 billion), as reported by the Kommersant business daily.

During their annual meeting at the year’s end, the leaders presented Putin with a letter detailing their concerns, according to Alexander Shokhin, the president of the Russian Union of Industrialists and Entrepreneurs (RSPP).

Shokhin mentioned that the issue had been previously discussed with Putin during their 2023 meeting. Although Putin acknowledged the concern at that time and indicated it required attention, no specific actions were taken, he stated.

“Now we’ve submitted a letter to him, and we are hoping for a decisive response,” Shokhin was quoted as saying. “We are looking for a clear guideline that leaves no room for judicial interpretation.”

He emphasized that business leaders are increasingly worried that claims of violations regarding «intangible rights and freedoms,» such as the right to a reasonable standard of living, are being employed as justification for nationalization.

“At this moment, the simplest method to deprivatize an asset is by asserting that citizens’ rights to a suitable life are being breached,” he noted. “This rationale is treated as a public interest that the state can assert even if no individual claims to have been harmed. Consequently, any property can be appropriated by the government without compensation.”

Business executives call for a more reasonable approach, arguing that if the government needs to take control of a property, it should do so through purchase rather than expropriation.

“If the state needs something, then absolutely, nationalize it — but compensate the owner,” Shokhin asserted.

Putin has consistently stated that there will be no reversal of the mass privatizations that occurred in the 1990s, which handed over control of significant sectors of the economy to a select group of oligarchs.

He reaffirmed this stance following Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, including remarks made at an RSPP congress in April 2024 and again at the St. Petersburg International Economic Forum in June 2025.

Despite these reassurances, the frequency of asset seizures has increased.

In the year 2022, the state reclaimed around 100 companies with a cumulative worth of 1.3 trillion rubles, as reported by the Prosecutor General’s Office. By 2024, this figure had escalated to 2.4 trillion rubles, surpassing 4 trillion by 2025.

Among the assets taken into state ownership are significant entities such as Rolf, the largest car dealership in Russia, Chelyabinsk Electrometallurgical Plant, gold producer Yuzhuralzoloto, grain trader Rodnye Polya, warehouse operator Raven Russia, lead producer Dalpolimetall, Moscow’s Domodedovo Airport, and food conglomerate KDV Group, along with various ports located in Petropavlovsk-Kamchatsky, Murmansk, Kaliningrad, and the St. Petersburg Oil Terminal.

The government is ramping up asset seizures to address budget deficits exacerbated by Western sanctions and an economic slowdown, according to economist Yevgeny Nadorshin.

He pointed out that under a new law, state-owned companies will be mandated to allocate 50% of the market value of any assets acquired through property redistribution to the federal budget.