Commerce in Moscow Has New Feel to It : Optimism, Shift in Power Change Decision Making, U.S. Companies Report

In the euphoria after the defeat of the Soviet coup plotters, there were signs Thursday that the pathways of commerce in the Soviet Union are changing.

With the Soviet republics asserting themselves politically, their leaders’ role in closing business deals seems to be ascending, U.S. business executives said.

Robert L. Schwartz, president of Los Angeles-based International Development Corp., said his Russian partners told him Thursday that obstacles to his proposed hotel and office development had vanished with the coup’s defeat.

Hard-liners in Leningrad had opposed giving Schwartz a 99-year lease on 25 acres in the downtown area of the Soviet Union’s second-largest city. But Leningrad’s radical mayor supported Schwartz’s project.

“Our partners told us that the project will now move ahead with double speed,” an amazed Schwartz said.

But others with existing ventures in the Soviet Union are finding that the new power of the local governments is complicating things--at least temporarily.

Russian Federation President Boris N. Yeltsin’s demand Thursday that the Communist Party turn its property over to the Russian Republic confused the legal status of Irvine-based Americom International Corp.’s hotel venture in Moscow.

The hotel--the Radisson Slavjanskaya Hotel & Business Center--started operating in June in cooperation with the Soviet tourism agency, Intourist, which owns 50% of the venture and built the $110-million facility.

“Based on Yeltsin’s speech to the Russian Parliament . . . it seems that there is a new owner of this building--the Russian Republic,” said Richard R. Monroe, who manages Americom’s business center in the 10-story, U-shaped complex on the banks of the Moscow River.

“Intourist is breaking up into different parts, companies,” Monroe said in a telephone interview from Moscow. “The problem we have is Intourist is our legal joint-venture partner. I don’t know--where do we go from here?”

Yeltsin’s demands may have an impact on other joint ventures between U.S. firms and the Soviet government--especially if other republics follow suit. It wasn’t clear Thursday how many projects might be affected.

Some of the better known joint ventures have local government partners, trade experts said. The city of Moscow, for example, is the government partner in McDonald’s Soviet venture.

Robert Dean, head of the Soviet practice for the Washington law firm Coudert Bros., said the situation with Americom’s hotel is somewhat unusual, in that haggling over the government ownership stake started before the coup.

Monroe explained that Americom received a proposal from the Russian Cabinet of Ministers on Aug. 2. calling for the Russian Republic to buy out Intourist’s 50% share in the venture.

The remaining 50% is owned by RadAmer, a joint venture 20% owned by Radisson Hotels International and 80% owned by Americom. Monroe said there’s no indication on how much the Russian Republic will pay for Intourist’s stake if the Aug. 2 proposal is adopted.

During the crisis, Americom had three telephone lines available for communication outside the Soviet Union. The firm’s president, Paul Tatum, lent a cellular phone to Yeltsin’s aides in the barricaded Russian Federation headquarters during the crisis.

Monroe expressed confidence that the unsettled ownership question would ultimately be resolved.

Elsewhere in Moscow, some American workers were nonplussed amid all the celebrating. Alex Krimsky, a New Yorker who works for International Development, plodded through paperwork in his downtown office.

“For me, it’s business as usual,” said Krimsky, who watched much of the festivities on television. “It will be awhile before people here get their act together.”

More upbeat was Richard Nicholson, a Moscow-based trade consultant who spent much of the day Thursday calling on clients.

“There is a light and happy feeling in Moscow, a warmth that is not always evident,” he said in a telephone interview. “There is a tremendous feeling of hope, and I feel it, too. It’s contagious.”