The Moscow Times has a full report on events at the St. Petersburg International Economic Forum: including details of Medvedev’s desire to make the ruble a reserve currency and to turn Moscow into an international finance center. Care for a pinch of salt to accompany the President’s modernization plans? The forum reportedly saw more than 50 deals, worth more than €15 billion, take place. Russia is planning to invest $4 billion into its nascent pharmaceuticals sector: meanwhile a new Sanofi-Aventis, eager to participate in increasing domestic drug production, has just opened an insulin factory. Given the lacuna in the pensions fund, Russians may well have to face higher gasoline prices and a longer working life, Finance Minister Alexei Kudrin has warned. Farming machinery manufacturer Deere & Company’s 2010 looks likely to be as dismal as that of 2009. Troika Dialog has sold 17.1% of truck maker KamAZ at a premium. Artem Volynets, one of Oleg Deripaska’s right handmen, tells the Times why Hong Kong is the place for an IPO.