Putin and Trump: Enemies, allies or competitors? – Nordea Markets

Tatiana Evdokimova, Research Analyst at Nordea Markets, notes that during the press conference of latest meet, Trump and Putin exchanged quite a number of warm remarks, promising to unfreeze Russian-American relations, to proceed to further meetings, to work together on the international issues and deepen cooperation in numerous spheres.

Key Quotes

“They characterized their meeting as constructive and beneficial, providing a chance to understand each other better and to make the first important step in this direction. Trump even went as far as to say that the US-Russia relationship has never been worse than it is now but that has changed as of about four hours ago.”

“At the same time the leaders apparently failed to reach any noticeable progress on the key controversies and just managed to restore a somewhat more constructive dialogue between the two countries.”

“Charges against 12 Russian intelligence officers made on July 13 for alleged meddling in the US presidential elections in 2016 created negative news flow ahead of the summit. New charges being so fresh, this topic naturally became central in the Q&A session. Trump’s responses caused massive critique from both American political parties for his subtle support of Putin’s position on the matter. Putin’s offer to help investigate Russian meddling in US permitted to somewhat smooth this topic during press conference.”

“Despite the lack of mutual concessions, the sides still agreed to foster economic cooperation through establishing a high-level group that could unite captains of Russian and American business. The two sides thus showed that there is mutual interest in closer economic ties despite all the political controversies.”

“However, the press conference hasn’t brought any positive surprises, and Russian markets remained relatively calm throughout the event.”