Foreign companies have suffered more than $170 billion in direct losses in Russia since the country launched its full-scale invasion of Ukraine in 2022, according to the KSE Institute. The losses stem from asset write-offs, business seizures, aggressive court rulings, and punitive exit taxes, underscoring the increasingly hostile business climate in Russia.
Asset write-offs accounted for the bulk of the losses, exceeding $167 billion. More than $57 billion of this sum resulted from companies whose assets were seized by Russian authorities and transferred to local firms or state entities. The estimated market value of these expropriated assets was around $74 billion before the takeovers, highlighting the scale of Russia’s economic coercion.
Foreign firms were also compelled to pay at least $3 billion in so-called “exit taxes”—a mandatory levy on asset sales that was drastically increased in 2023.
Companies from the United States bore the highest losses at $46 billion, followed by those from Germany ($44.5 billion), the United Kingdom ($35.1 billion), France ($12.1 billion), Austria ($6.7 billion), and Finland ($5.1 billion).
Among the most severe financial write-offs was British energy major BP, which took a staggering $25.5 billion hit following its forced departure from Russian oil giant Rosneft. German utilities Uniper and Fortum lost $22 billion and $4.07 billion, respectively, due to nationalization. ExxonMobil recorded a $4 billion write-off, while Société Générale, one of the largest financial firms affected, registered a $3.3 billion loss from exiting Rosbank.
At least 30 companies—including Carlsberg, Danone, Fortum, Wintershall Dea, Uniper, and ExxonMobil—fell victim to forced asset seizures, as Moscow escalated its economic stranglehold on foreign-owned infrastructure.
The Kremlin’s economic pressure tactics have transformed its business environment into a high-risk, predatory landscape. For responsible businesses, the path is straightforward: it is time to face reality, end operations, and leave Russia.