JENNIFER LUDDEN, Host:
Welcome.
JOE NOCERA: Thanks for having me, Jennifer.
LUDDEN: Joe, you wrote that it took the judge - is this right - more than three days to read his decision against Mikhail Khodorkovsky?
NOCERA: Yes. It was an 800-page decision. Although people who were in the courtroom tell me that basically he was just reading by and large from the prosecutor's initial indictment.
LUDDEN: Okay. So explain this case briefly to us.
NOCERA: Well, the political aspect of it is, you know, he is Vladimir Putin's number one enemy, and Putin has had him in jail for six or seven years on trumped up tax charges. They appropriated the company Yukos that he ran, which was, by the way, the best run company in Russia. They gave it to another state-run oil company. And now with his parole approaching, they don't want him out of jail. So they've made even more absurd charges this time around. And, you know, he was found, of course, guilty as charged.
LUDDEN: So six more years in jail. From a business perspective, how do you think this will impact Russia's economy?
NOCERA: Russia is a country in desperate need of foreign capital. It's about to try and do a two-year privatization program where it's going to sell off minority shares of state-run companies. And one of the companies where it's going to sell these minority shares is Rosneft. Rosneft is the company that wound up with all the Yukos assets. So basically, having stolen investors' assets six years ago, they now want to resell them...
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NOCERA: ...these stolen assets, to a new round of investments. It's part of the reason why Russia has had such a terrible time sort of climbing out of economic difficulty, because foreign investors don't want to do business there.
LUDDEN: Now what about specifically, you know, economic relations between Russia and the U.S.?
NOCERA: Well, they won't change that much. I mean the Obama administration has for the first time made some, you know, moderately strong statements about this case. But the truth of the matter is that the U.S. and Russia have, you know, nuclear treaties and so many things that they have to deal with that it's a little unlikely, and a little unfortunate, I would add, that the administration is not going to put this case at the top of their grievances, but they probably won't.
LUDDEN: Okay. Well, Joe, before we let you go, it's the start of a new year and we're putting a twist here on some traditional resolutions, something we're calling New Year's resolutions for other people.
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LUDDEN: So here's your chance. What resolutions would you like to offer for the movers and shakers in the economy?
NOCERA: All right. So resolution number one, the House Republicans and the Financial Services Committee have vowed to reform Fannie and Freddie and try and get the government out of the housing market. Given the fact that the government now guarantees 95 percent of all mortgages and without which there would be no housing market, I wish them well in this resolution but I think it's going to go the way of most New Year's resolutions.
LUDDEN: Along with the diet.
NOCERA: That's number one.
LUDDEN: Okay.
NOCERA: Resolution number three for me is Ben Bernanke resolves that the next time he comes up with a stimulus plan, it won't sound like a cruise ship.
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LUDDEN: Do you have acronym ready?
NOCERA: Yeah, I haven't figured that out yet. That's my resolution. But, you know, this one was called QE2, for quantitative easing number two.
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NOCERA: My final resolution is for President Obama. His resolution is going to somehow figure out how to make Elizabeth Warren the official Senate-appointed head of the new Consumer Protection Bureau, which I might add starts up officially in July.
LUDDEN: And she's in there temporarily now, right?
NOCERA: That's right, and she's done it without Senate appointment, but she's quote-unquote an adviser to the president, and she has not officially got this job. But, you know, I do think she would be the best person for the job. She cares about these issues passionately. She understands them. It's good that she's in there helping to set up this agency. So I'm hoping that this is one resolution that the president, who has proved to be remarkably effective since the November election, is one that he can pull off.
LUDDEN: Joe, thank you.
NOCERA: Thanks so much for having me. And Happy New Year. Transcript provided by NPR, Copyright NPR.