When the head of the Kremlin’s oil major Rosneft, Igor Sechin, went to see Prime Minister Dmitry Medvedev last month to report on his achievements, he proudly boasted about a bullish report from the U.S. investment bank Goldman Sachs. Goldman’s analysts said they had spotted a buying opportunity in the Russian oil sector. While energy companies around the world had been hit hard by a global fall in prices, Russia’s oil companies had been spared some of the damage thanks to a collapse in the rouble which lowered their costs. In fact, Goldman said, Russia’s oil industry, the world’s biggest by volume, was also its most profitable. A month later, investors don’t yet seem to have heeded Goldman’s advice to buy in. Most are still spooked away from Russia by international financial sanctions imposed by the United States and EU over the conflict in Ukraine. But the taxman has […]