If you remember the Panama Papers we had multiple major Nordic banks being involved in money laundering with sanctioned Russian oligarchs. The result was multiple CEO's being forced resign, cash flows worth many hundred billions, several employees arrested, some employees that fled their own country to avoid prosecution. After this leak we have multiple bank leaks with similar stories fraud, tax evasion, and evading of international sanctions.
We can put some wishful thinking that Novatek is the exception here and has no shell companies, no tax schemes, no avoidance of sanctions, no unaccounted money flow hopping around between banks in order to avoid insight. How likely is it, and how much more likely is it that with the right access to bank records or secret service files, some investigative journalist will have a field day describing just how much money ended up in the hands of the Russian government?
We can put some wishful thinking that Novatek is the exception here and has no shell companies, no tax schemes, no avoidance of sanctions, no unaccounted money flow hopping around between banks in order to avoid insight. How likely is it, and how much more likely is it that with the right access to bank records or secret service files, some investigative journalist will have a field day describing just how much money ended up in the hands of the Russian government?