This points up something I've noticed. The deals made when Soviet industry was first privatized, in Russia as well as in Ukraine, sound like robbery in hindsight. But they don't take into account the situation at the time, when many of these industries were at the edge of collapse.
Once the country has stabilized, and bankruptcy averted, its easy to say the industry was worth much more, but that is after the fact.
The old soviet economy was not a cash economy, it ran on politics, influence, command. If an industry was worth a billion on the open market, who rising from within the soviet economy was likely to have a billion in his sock drawer? If the industry sold to a Russian, or a Ukrainian for a mere $100 million, who in fact was going to have even that kind of money?
The alternative might be to sell to international investors who did have cash, but then you have the opposite complaint, of foreigners picking up assets at fire-sale prices.
Then you have the next problem, which is the fact that to invest in a country on the edge of collapse is not for the faint of heart, and to invest in a country that has no commercial law is again not for your average 401k account manager. If rule of law is not firmly in place, the only way anyone can guard their assets is through personal influence, personal contacts, and the ability to defend themselves physically. By definition, men who can operate in this pre-legal environment are "oligarchs", mafia. No one else can operate in this environment.
Over time laws are enacted, because even oligarchs have an interest in defending their property legally. If you are protected by law, you don't need to control who sits in the presidential palace, after all. And over time, given the will to do so, you transition to a market economy. But to point to the men who initially stepped forward to take over failing businesses in an imploding country, and complain after the fact, is pointless.
Putin has complained about the "oligarchs", but so far has only gone after a couple. Yuschenko has come into office promising to roll back the original privatizations, and this strikes me as either dangerous or corrupt, or both. If it is well intentioned, it proves that in Ukraine the rules can be changed after the fact, and who would want to invest in such a country? And if it is for corrupt reasons, simply taking an asset away from an opponent to award it to a friend, again, who would want to invest in such a country?
In both countries, it seems to me, now that the assets have been distributed, the proper answer is to draw a curtain over the past, and set about building a body of commercial law. Forget how much who paid for what, and just go forward.
A friend of mine was on a team that went into the "stans" after the collapse, looking at assets that might be worth investing in, on behalf of a middle-sized oil company. His recommendation was for them to steer clear. The industries were in terrible shape, the labor relations were toxic, the governments themselves corrupt and dangerous to the point of scary. And so that company did not invest. Other companies did invest, and have done well, but the point is that investing in the ex-soviet union in the months following the collapse was not a game for just anyone. The picture now is completely different, but at that time no one could predict how it was going to turn out.
What is your opinion?
As for Ukraine, between confiscations, government price settings on commodities, export bans, minimal wage being wretched up (social spending vs business investment) and the planned removal of all opposition elected politicians to be replaced by Yushchenko lackies, Ukraine is quickly becoming an ideal Sorocracy.