Big is good, bigger even better

Russia now it has its own version of Saudi Arabia’s Aramco. State-controlled Gazprom’s purchase of a majority stake in oil company Sibneft for $13bn creates an energy behemoth with tentacles and pipelines spreading out across the world. It also creates a vehicle to project Russian power abroad, a long-held Kremlin dream even if the result is an economists’ nightmare. The Russian state will control over half of national oil production following the deal. It is a safe bet that growing state interf...