With the right advice, achieving respectability is merely a question of time and money. After Russia's default and financial crash in August 1998, foreign investors seemed to have lost their illusions. Practices previously dismissed as mere teething troubles, such as grotesque standards of corporate governance, the abuse of minority shareholders, and contemptuous disregard for creditors, suddenly became glaring, ingrained flaws. One scalded banker said at the time that he would "rather eat nuclear waste" than invest in Russia again. Of course in Russia it is possible to do both.
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