‘After Stalin, there followed a series of unelected despots who had sheltered in his shadow for years: Khrushchev, Kosygin, Brezhnev, Andropov and Chernenko, who all clung on to power until they died or were forcibly removed from office. And then suddenly, almost without warning, that all changed overnight when Mikhail Gorbachev appeared on the scene and announced the birth of glasnost. A simple translation being, the policy or practice of more open consultative government and a wider dissemination of information.
‘From March 1990, when Gorbachev became the first elected president of the Soviet Union, the country began to change rapidly, and for the first time entrepreneurs were able to operate without the restrictions of a centralized command economy.
‘However, the people who oversaw this transformation were the same gang of thugs who’d run the old regime. How would you feel if the leader of the Communist Party in America was handed the keys to Fort Knox? And this despite the fact that the Soviet Union had one of the finest educational systems in the world, that is, if you wanted to be a philosopher, or a poet, but not if you wanted to be a businessman. In those days you had a better chance of studying Sanskrit at Moscow University than of finding your way around a balancesheet.
‘Russia has twenty-four per cent of the world’s gas reserves, twelve per cent of its oil, and more timber than any other nation on earth. But while the average worker may no longer consider himself a comrade, he is still earning less than the equivalent of fifteen dollars a week, and few people are paid more than fifty thousand a year. Less than my secretary. So the transition from Communism to capitalism was never going to be easy.
‘We are all aware that first impressions tend to linger, so I should not have been surprised when, after I had been back in my homeland for only a few hours, some of Russia’s problems were brought home to me. I was standing on a street corner trying to get a taxi, and I couldn’t help noticing that while there was no shortage of BMWs, Mercedes and Jaguars, there was almost no sign of a Ford Fiesta or a VW Polo. The disparity between rich and poor is starker in Russia than in any other nation on earth. Two per cent of Russians own ninety-eight per cent of the national wealth, so who can blame ordinary citizens for rejecting capitalism and wanting to return to what they now regard as the good old days of Communism? If Western values are to prevail, what Russia most needs is a middle class who, through hard work and diligence, can benefit from their country’s staggering wealth and natural resources.
‘This doesn’t mean that there aren’t great opportunities to do business in Russia. Of course there are. However, if you’re thinking of going east, young man, be warned — it’s not for the faint-hearted.
‘Mr Schwab told you that Lowell’s had closed a deal that made my bank a thousand per cent profit in a year. But what he didn’t tell you was that we also signed three other contracts where we lost every penny of our investment, and in one case even before the ink was dry on the paper. So the golden rule for any company considering opening a branch in Russia is to choose your partner wisely. When there’s the potential for a thousand per cent profit in a year, the stupid, the greedy and the downright dishonest will appear like cockroaches from under the floorboards. And should your partner breach a contract, don’t bother to sue, because the judge will almost certainly be on their payroll.
‘Could this all change for the better? Yes. In the year 2000, the Russian people will go to the polls to choose a new president. We can safely assume they won’t re-elect Boris Yeltsin, who by now would have been impeached in Washington and banished to the Tower in London.’
Laughter followed, humour often emphasizing the truth. Alex turned a page.
‘The Communist Party, which appeared to be dead and buried a decade ago, has once again raised its head, and is now comfortably ahead in the polls. But if a candidate were to stand for president whose first interest was in democracy, and not in lining their own pockets, who knows what could be achieved?
‘You see before you a Russian who escaped to America some thirty years ago, but who in recent years has regularly returned to his homeland, because Lowell’s Bank takes the long view. I hope that in a hundred years’ time, America will still be Russia’s greatest rival. Not on the battlefield, but in the boardroom. Not in the nuclear arms race, but in the race to cure disease. Not on the streets, but in the classrooms. But that can only be achieved if every Russian vote is of equal weight.’
A long round of applause followed, as Alex turned another page.
‘Two hundred years ago, America was at war with Britain. In the past century, the two nations have twice united to fight a common enemy. Why shouldn’t America and Russia have a similar aim?’ Alex lowered his voice almost to a whisper. ‘I hope there are those among you who will join me, and try to make that ideal possible by building bridges and not destroying them, and by believing, as any civilized society should, that all men and women are born equal, whatever country they are born in. I can only hope that the next generation of Russians will, like the next generation of Americans, take that for granted.’
An audience that had decided to wait and hear Alex’s words before they passed judgement, rose as one, and caused him to wonder, not for the first time, if he should have taken Lawrence’s place not in the boardroom, but in the political arena.
‘You were magnificent, my darling,’ said Anna when he walked off the stage. ‘But I don’t remember those last couple of paragraphs when you were rehearsing your speech in the bathroom this morning.’
Alex didn’t comment. And it didn’t help, during the next couple of days, that whenever he was stopped in the conference hall, in his hotel, in the street, and even at the airport, delegates suggested, ‘Perhaps you are the man who should be standing for president in your country?’ And they didn’t mean America.
‘You did what?’ said Doug Ackroyd.
‘I sold one per cent of my shares in Lowell’s for twenty million dollars,’ said Evelyn proudly.
‘Why would you do something as stupid as that?’
‘Because by letting go of one per cent for twenty million, I established that the true value of my fifty per cent was a billion dollars.’
‘While at the same time you handed over control of the bank to Karpenko,’ said Ackroyd, spitting out the words. ‘They now have fifty-one per cent of the company, while you only have forty-nine.’
‘No,’ protested Evelyn, ‘I didn’t sell my one per cent to the bank.’
‘Then to whom, dare I ask?’
‘To George Soros, who I’m sure you’ll agree knows a damn sight more about banking and investments than either of us.’
‘Indeed he does,’ said Ackroyd. ‘But how, may I ask, did you happen to bump into the great man?’
‘I met him two weeks ago in Monte Carlo. A happy coincidence, don’t you think?’
‘No, I do not think it was a happy coincidence, Evelyn. It was a well-planned set-up, and you fell for it.’
‘How can you say that?’
‘Because two weeks ago George Soros was in Davos, giving a lecture on the Exchange Rate Mechanism. I know, because I was sitting in the audience.’
Evelyn’s legs gave way and she collapsed into the nearest chair. She was silent for some time before saying, ‘So what do I do now?’
‘Accept the bank’s offer of six hundred million dollars before they change their mind.’