MOSCOW, April 4 (Reuters) – Russia’s Energy Ministry has
outlined a new tax policy designed to attract tens of billions
of dollars of investment into promising but challenging new oil
provinces in Arctic offshore zones, government sources said on
Wednesday.

The world’s largest oil producer faces falling output in the
Soviet-era oil heartland of Western Siberia and will need to
open up its continental shelf to sustain output that, according
to some forecasts, would otherwise peak later this decade.

MOSCOW (Reuters) – Global average nickel prices this year will be slightly less than $20,000 per metric ton, which is almost equal to the average level for the first quarter, Norilsk Nickel’s head of marketing Viktor Sprogis said at the Reuters Mining and Metals Summit.

“There is no reason to believe that the average price will go below these average levels significantly,” he said at the summit, held at the Reuters office in Moscow on Thursday.

MOSCOW (Reuters) – Russian steelmaker Severstal (CHMF.MM: Quote, Profile, Research, Stock Buzz) is well placed to benefit from the proposed Keystone XL oil pipeline that could boost demand for output from its U.S. mills, a senior executive said.

The U.S. Administration deferred the controversial $13 billion pipeline, which would deliver Canadian crude to the U.S. market, earlier this year.

MOSCOW, March 29 (Reuters) – The partners in a Gazprom-led
consortium to develop the giant offshore Shtokman gas
field, which still needs tax breaks to ensure it is profitable,
are likely to delay a final investment decision when they meet
later on Thursday.

A source close to the consortium said there was a “50-50
chance” the board could delay the final decision for a third
time in a year. If it is delayed, the next attempt is likely to
be set for June, the source added.

MOSCOW (Reuters) – A Russian banker shot five times close to London’s financial district had been days away from giving evidence to an investigation into the attempted murder of a former business associate, his lawyer has said.

German Gorbuntsov, who at the height of his business empire owned four Russian banks, was walking towards his apartment block near the Canary Wharf banking district when a gunman opened fire on Tuesday evening, leaving him badly injured.

MOSCOW, March 25 (Reuters) – A Russian banker shot five
times close to London’s financial district had been days away
from giving evidence to an investigation into the attempted
murder of a former business associate, his lawyer has said.

German Gorbuntsov, who at the height of his business empire
owned four Russian banks, was walking towards his apartment
block near the Canary Wharf banking district when a gunman
opened fire on Tuesday evening, leaving him badly injured.

MOSCOW (Reuters) – Vladimir Putin on Thursday made his first energy appointment since his re-election as Russian president, naming Rosneft first vice president Pavel Fedorov a deputy energy minister.

Fedorov, a former Morgan Stanley banker who helped negotiate a landmark Arctic drilling deal with U.S. ExxonMobil during his tenure at the state oil firm, is expected to oversee efforts to pull foreign investment into the energy sector.

MOSCOW, Feb 28 (Reuters) – Russian state-controlled
oil company Rosneft made a small price concession to
China, the single biggest consumer of oil from its new eastern
fields, to resolve a long-running dispute, a Russian industry
source said on Tuesday.

China buys 300,000 barrels per day of Russian oil, mostly
delivered from the new oil fields of Eastern Siberia via a new
pipeline.

MOSCOW, Feb 17 (Reuters) – Two negatives make a
positive when the brains of Vladimir Putin and Silvio Berlusconi
are fused together in a satirical play that premiered this week
in Moscow, just over two weeks before a presidential election in
Russia.

“BerlusPutin”, a Russian adaptation of Italian Nobel
laureate Dario Fo’s play “The Double Headed Anomaly”, is being
performed by Moscow’s Teatr.doc, an independent theatre company
housed in a dusty cellar in the centre of the Russian capital.

MOSCOW, Jan 31 (Reuters) – Russia is considering a
protective grain export duty to put a brake on record exports,
Deputy Agriculture Minister Ilya Shestakov told Reuters on
Tuesday.

“We are actively discussing it. It is an important aspect of
our activity. No one is denying the likelihood,” Shestakov said
on the sidelines of a grains conference held by the Institute
for Agricultural Markers Research (IKAR).