aThe meeting was over, it looked more like a business negotiation, not a peace parley. On February 18th, when Kremlin subordinates met Donald Trump’s diplomats in Saudi Arabia, Kiril Dmitriev recorded (probably exaggerated) numbers. He said American companies lost $324 billion by leaving Russia after the war in Ukraine began. Would you like to go back? Dmitliv promoted the opportunities for American businesses and significantly increased the Moscow restaurant scene. His message found receptive ears. American Secretary of State Marco Rubio was passionate about the “historic economic investment opportunities” of the peace agreement. Dmitliff praised Trump for launching a “constructive conversation.”
The gentle, 49-year-old stood out from the grizzled diplomats who made up the rest of the Russian delegation. But from Vladimir Putin’s point of view, he had good reason to become a part of it. As one of Russia’s national support investment funds, Dmitriev has cut transactions for over a decade. Putin hopes America will ease sanctions on his economy. By hanging business opportunities and claiming that sanctions cost American companies money, Dmitriev is trying to convince Trump to do so.
Dmitriev’s ease in the American businessman’s company makes him an ideal envoy for Trump World. While many of Putin’s circles rose through security services, Dmitriev started in California in the 1990s. His Stanford degree led to his work at consulting firm McKinsey and bank Goldman Sachs. In 2000 he received an MBA from Harvard Business School, a finishing school for Western capitalists. He then returned to Russia, where Putin was at the beginning of his first term.
Dmitrievi immediately made the use of his corporate qualifications. One of his first jobs in Russia was the US Russian Investment Fund, which helped the US government establish the opening up Russia to foreign capital. The other was Icon Private Equity, which managed the property of the oligarch Victor Pinchuk.
Mixed it with the post-Soviet elite and the door opened. His marriage also married Natalia Popova, the television host and friend of Putin’s daughter. Part-time model Ms. Popova once shared her Moscow home with two Savals (a kind of wild African cat) and told her husband on state television for a documentary series about doing business in the Gulf. I interviewed him.
In 2011, Dmitliv persuaded Putin to sit down as President Putin and set up the Russian Direct Investment Fund (RDIF). He’s been doing it ever since. RDIF is a rare type of state fund. Rather than investing the country’s fossil fuel abundance in overseas assets, RDIF works like a private equity company and seeks foreign investors to partner with the Kremlin in a joint venture within Russia. Shortly after he took up his job, Dmitriev returned to America. For a while, investors were hooked. Blackstone boss Stephen Schwarzman and Apollo Global Management’s Leon Black were two private equity titans who became RDIF advisors.
The love didn’t last long. After Russia annexed Crimea in 2014, the pair ended their relationship with RDIF. Sanctions have made it difficult to attract Western capitals. But it was Dmitriev’s skill in finding non-Western financial sources that proved his worth to Putin, as explained by David Zakhony of George Washington University. Money flooded RDIF from Asia and the Bay. In 2015, Saudi Arabia invested $10 billion in RDIF. Two years later, China did the same thing. By 2022, RDIF had promoted over $400 billion in foreign investment in Russia across 100 transactions, claiming solid returns. In 2022, after a full-scale invasion of Russia’s Ukraine, the US struck RDIF and Dmitriev with sanctions. RDIF is “widely regarded” for Putin, the US Treasury Department said.
Mr. Dmitliff is more than just a man of money. Dmitriev was at the forefront of the Kremlin vaccine diplomacy when RDIF funded Russia’s Sputnik V vaccine during the pandemic. This is a strategy aimed at increasing Russia’s global status by selling vaccines to poor countries. And recently he has established himself as Putin’s main envoy to Trump’s circle. Dmitriev was busy behind the scenes when Russia released imprisoned American teacher Mark Vogel on February 11 in exchange for the American release of cybercriminal Alexander Vinnik. Steve Witkov, the real estate tycoon whom Trump created one of his top diplomatic negotiators, praised Dmitriev as a “important interlocutor.”
In Saudi Arabia, Dmitriev helped turn peace discussions into meetings about money, giving the event a surreal atmosphere. In doing so, he saw access to Ukrainian mineral wealth and played with Trump’s tendency to hold back American aid as one of the main reasons for ending the war. “The Kremlin wants to build these talks as corporate negotiations. Businessmen are talking to businessmen about politics,” Zacony says. You can see that both parties can practice the art of trading.■
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