Maximilian Hess
Founder - Enmetena Advisory, Fellow @FPRI & @IISS_org. Eurasia, political economy, sanctions, international affairs, debt & sovereignty.
Buy my book Economic War: Ukraine & The Global Conflict Between Russia & The West:
linktr.ee/EconomicWar
- Reposted by Maximilian Hess[Not loaded yet]
- Tajikistan's environmentally disastrous dam of corruption, now in its 50th year of construction, reports tens of millions of dollars in losses and hundreds of millions of dollars in 'missing' funds. Same as it ever was! eurasianet.org/audit-raises...
- Reposted by Maximilian Hess9/So what is Europe to do? Not this...It has to wake up and understand that an alternative international order is being put on the table. It is not based on rules but hierarchy and extraction. Tepid finger waging will lead to domination. www.theguardian.com/world/live/2...
- Reposted by Maximilian Hess[Not loaded yet]
- Amid reports that ≈400 (!) tourists are stranded on the Yemeni island of Socotra, amid Saudi-UAE proxy fights in Yemen, time to reshare this piece I wrote about visiting the island 4 years ago and what de facto Emirati control means for the place & its inhabitants inkstickmedia.com/the-socotri-...
- Russia signed a treaty to defend Venezuela just two months ago but its crickets this morning from the Kremlin. Utter humiliation and evidence of just how weak it is globally.
- Russian Foreign Ministry statement is out and is extremely soft, calls for “prevention of further escalation and to focus on finding a way to advance through dialogue”.
- Your regular reminder that any Western comopany reporting its assets in Russia as not marked down to 0 for the last 3 years has been essentially defrauding its investors www.ft.com/content/616d...
- Given Putin is obviously going to reject the peace deal (but try and blame it on Kyiv and Europe), more sanctions should be the base case even from the Trump Admin - as I have long argued - rather than the shock so many treated it as in October and will again soon www.bloomberg.com/news/article...
- The most British way of fighting the British
- Trump’s Special Representative for Belarus John Coale announced after meeting Lukashenko that Washington will lift sanctions on Belarusian Potash. It’s the second step in the Trump Admin’s easing strategy after sanctions on the airline Belavia were lifted. zerkalo-access.space/news/economi...
- Kazakhmys to be sold, the first potential ding to the major oligarchs outside Nazarbayev family since de-Nazarbayevification? Ogay & Kim the old controlling shareholders are longtime regime insiders, theyre also key stakeholders in the larger KAZ Minerals www.mining.com/web/kazakhmy...
- Trump Admin extends sanctions deadline for sale of Lukoil's foreign assets by just over one month, until 17 January www.reuters.com/business/aut...
- I see the ‘defenders of free speech’ are hard at work www.bloomberg.com/news/article...
- Reposted by Maximilian Hess[Not loaded yet]
- Excellent review & essay by @newlefteviews.bsky.social on thinking about capitalism's role today, including this key reminder that the global economic order is itself responsible for the domestic challenges to it in the US that risk undermining its key patron www.newstatesman.com/ideas/2025/1...
- Reposted by Maximilian Hess[Not loaded yet]
- Meh this is just the license for the retail stations, not sale of the oversees assets
- Reposted by Maximilian Hess[Not loaded yet]
- Can anyone recommend some books on Guinea-Conakry? Preferably ones that aren’t just about Sekou Toure
- Reposted by Maximilian Hess[Not loaded yet]
- Congrats to @joannalillis.bsky.social on the London launch of Silk Mirage: Through the Looking Glass in Uzbekistan
- OFAC clarifies that it is Trump Admin’s policy that it will only approve of sales of Lukoil International’s assets (which Gunvor was willing to pay $22 billion for) if that sale does not see money actually flow to Lukoil while sanctions on Lukoil remain ofac.treasury.gov/faqs/1224
- Cab driver in Zimbabwe started spontaneously telling me about how he hates Russia for what they’ve done to Ukraine #TakeThatThomasFriedman
- Off to South Africa, Zimbabwe, E-Swatini, Mozambique, Zimbabwe and Zambia for the next 20 Days. Don't @ me please. :)
- Big weeks in sanctions developments, but the fate of Lukoil's proposed sale of its foreign assets to Gunvor and belatedly sanctions-afflicted refiner NIS in Serbia will set major precedents, more from me here: conflictandcredit.substack.com/p/sanctions-...
- башня Татлина жив! Но, в Англии (Tatlin’s tower lives, but in England…)
- Quite the geo-economic day in the Caucasus, Russia ships oil to refinery in Georgia for the first time (Georgia didn't have a refinery before) Kazakh wheat shipped via Azerbaijan to Armenia, a first since USSR's collapse t.co/31RbvV2HC4 t.co/msA5cowQvx
- Reposted by Maximilian Hess
[Not loaded yet] - Georgian government has raided home of ex prosecutor general Partskhaladze (US sanctioned for working with FSB), i former head of the State Security Service Liluashvili & former two time premier Irakli Gharibashvili Falling out been rumored for a while… but wow tvpirveli.ge/ka/siaxleebi...
- To be fair, Stripe’s publishing arm published a book last year claiming that bubbles are good. I did not find it convincing… www.stripe.press/boom
- To quote a colleague, "Tamerlane would be proud"
- Reposted by Maximilian Hess[Not loaded yet]
- Since Russia’s full scale invasion of Ukraine in 2022, Putin has had 3 asks of Xi: military & political support for war, a deal on Power of Siberia 2, & unrestricted access to Chinese financial markets. In the last 10 days, he’s gotten close to clinching latter two on.ft.com/3JJUqBD
- Kazakhstan's foreign minister Murat Nurtleu detained alongside Dagestani-Kazakh businessman Gadzhi Gadzhiev orda.kz/zaderzhany-m... unclear if related but Gadzheiv was accused of involvement in journalist Aydos Sadykov's assassination in Ukraine last year rsf.org/en/journalis...
- Reposted by Maximilian Hess[Not loaded yet]
- Reposted by Maximilian Hess[Not loaded yet]
- Reposted by Maximilian Hess[Not loaded yet]
- China’s first confirmed purchase of LNG from Russia’s U.S.-sanctioned Arctic 2 LNG site shows Trump’s secondary sanctions threat is weakening in the face of his policy flip-flopping gcaptain.com/russias-arct...
- Doggo enjoying the Holland Park Opera’s practice sessions
- Reposted by Maximilian Hess[Not loaded yet]
- Almost every year I’ve attended, I’ve noticed at least 2/3rds of all artists exhibiting at the Venice Biennale are based in Berlin
- Reposted by Maximilian Hess[Not loaded yet]
- Idk what’s crazier, the CIA-KGB combined mortgage financing or the $40k upper east side two bedroom apartment
- Trump’s envoy - who has infamously & stupidly relied on the Kremlin’s translators for meetings with Putin - reportedly misunderstood Putin who wasn’t offering Russian withdrawals from Kherson and Zaporizhzhia but restating his maximalist demands. www.bild.de/politik/ausl...
