Russian Oligarchs Weigh Succession as ‘Bears’ Prowl for Fortune

[Joanne98]

July 9 (Bloomberg) -- For Alexander Lebedev, hardly a week goes by without a call from a crooked security-services agent or cop angling for a chunk of his $3.4 billion fortune. It’s not a lifestyle he wishes for his son, Evgeny.

“Business in our country is like wrestling with bears,” Lebedev said in an interview with Bloomberg Businessweek for its July 12 issue. “I’m not sure you’d want to pass that on to your son -- would you?”

At 50, Lebedev is already pondering a dilemma that will confront the entrepreneurs and industrialists who amassed riches in the early years of post-communist Russia: What will become of their billions -- sometimes acquired through unorthodox means -- and how should they plan their successions?

By 2020, the average age of the nation’s top 50 businessmen will exceed 60. While the wealthy may outlive the average male lifespan of 62, the transfer of assets to the next generation is a pressing issue in a country where property rights can’t be guaranteed and corruption ranks on par with Cambodia, Venezuela and Sierra Leone, according to Berlin-based watchdog Transparency International.

http://noir.bloomberg.com/apps/news?pid=20601109&sid=ayompDLjL41o&pos=10

Russia should round up all these fuckers and hang them while they still have the chance!

[ck4829]

1. Right now, all the wealth in Russia is controlled by greedy sociopaths

But in a decade or two, it will all be controlled by greedy sociopaths who have an even bigger sense of entitlement and no idea what all that wealth means or where it even came from.

Be afraid for the Russian people who have to scrape by just to live, be very afraid.

[jtuck004]

2. ^^ Unlike in the United States where it is controlled by the benevolent and caring class^^^ n.t.