Comment by hobom
14 hours ago
The West told plenty of its companies, through public pressure or laws, that they have to divest from Russia, and they did. Rationally they recognized that selling their assets is financially more lucrative than just closing their operations and making 0$. Now why would an corporation which alleges to not be controlled by a government refuse to sell and forego billions in income, even though it is against the interest of their shareholders?
Because they don’t want to have a strong competitor in case they come back, or gave they competitor enter other markets they are still active in. Also, not all (if any) companies that divested from Russia sold "their assets" including IP such as algorithms.