From Anchorage to Geneva: How Trump’s Energy Leverage Is Steering Ukraine Peace Talks

Earlier this month, news emerged of an American financier with ties to the US President Donald Trump’s family having reached an agreement with a Russian energy company in the fall of 2025 to explore mobile liquefied natural gas development in Alaska. The disclosure of this deal, shortly after the latest US-mediated Russia-Ukraine talks in Geneva, signals a broader push by the Trump administration to normalize economic ties with Moscow as part of a negotiated settlement of the Ukraine war, while also applying diplomatic and economic pressure on both Kyiv and Moscow to accelerate a settlement.

American financier Gentry Beach, a longtime acquaintance of the US President Donald Trump’s eldest son, reached an agreement last autumn with the Russian energy producer Novatek to pursue natural gas development in Alaska, the New York Times (NYT), reported on February 19 th.

Beach said that the deal envisioned using a mobile liquefied natural gas plant being built by Novatek at its factory in Russia’s Murmansk region. The system has been developed by Novatek for shipping gas from the remote Russian Arctic, which involves cooling it into liquid form at a portable plant and then shipping it aboard icebreaking tankers.

Novatek, in its statement to the NYT, reportedly said that it was “indeed having negotiations on the potential use” of its technology to liquefy natural gas in remote northern Alaska without confirming whether it was working with Mr. Beach.

Per the Novatek’s statement as cited by the NYT report, the company pointed out the similarity in the climate of the Alaskan and Russian Arctic regions to demonstrate the viability of its technology in developing natural gas in Alaska.

“Experts have discussed this opportunity for many years,” Novatek was cited as saying by the NYT. “Having said that, all the arrangements can only be implemented subject to support from the Russian and U.S. authorities.”

Beach reportedly told the NYT that the negotiations took place in 2025 during meetings with Novatek chief executive Leonid Mikhelson in Dubai and Europe. Mikhelson is subject to sanctions by the United Kingdom and Canada, but not the US or the European Union (EU).

He is also said to have described Mikhelson as “very pro-American.”

That said, the American investor also noted that the agreement is at a preliminary stage and faces several hurdles, adding that he cannot divulge further details.

The NYT said that Beach’s proposed collaboration with Novatek could potentially rival the Trump-supported plan to construct a roughly 800-mile pipeline for transporting gas from Alaska’s Northern slope to the state’s southern coast for liquefaction and export.

Beach, however, argued that his initiative would complement, rather than compete with, the planned pipeline development.

A hedge fund and private equity investor, Beach served as a finance vice chairman for Donald Trump’s 2017 Presidential inauguration and he is a college friend of the US President’s eldest son, Donald Trump Jr.

Novatek’s liquefied natural gas (LNG) plant in the Yamal Peninsula in Siberia, Russia. (Image Source: Novatek)

However, while speaking to the NYT, Beach said that his relationship with the Trump family had no role in the Novatek deal, and noted that he did not “do any business with the Trumps on any level.” He also clarified that his agreement was not linked to any bilateral talks between the US and Russia.

He did say, though, that “this project is known about at the highest levels” in Moscow and Washington, and that he would soon announce the names of executives who would lead the project.

According to Beach, the current political environment in the United States has made the businesses in the country more willing to consider engagement with Russian firms, a shift he attributes to the transactional approach of the Trump administration.

“Trump is a transactional president,” Beach said in an interview with the NYT. “I don’t think people would have felt as comfortable working with Russian companies during the Biden administration as they do during the Trump administration.”

Why is this news important?

This news is in line with the Author’s projections made in his previous article, ‘ Trump, Putin, and Ukraine: A Geopolitical Turning Point?’, published on June 1 st, 2025, wherein he had stated that with the advent of second Trump administration in the US, Putin is on the cusp of realizing long-sought success of most, if not all of his concerted efforts since 2014.

In that article, the Author had pointed out that by improving relations with Russia, Trump intends to pull Russia away from China and for that he has to provide economic incentives to the Russian President Vladimir Putin, as ever since Russia’s invasion of Ukraine in 2022 and ensuing Western sanctions against Russia, the Russian economy has been increasingly becoming dependent on trade with China to remain afloat.

And, Russia’s increasing dependence on trade with China has put Beijing in the position to dictate the terms of the overall bilateral economic relations between the two countries, which is causing growing frustration within the Russian business class over the difficulties of doing business with China.

The aforesaid assessments were made in the context of US-led peace negotiations between Russia and Ukraine to end their ongoing war since 2022, and with the emergence of this recent news report, the Author would like to use this opportunity to double down on his assessments made in all his previous articles relating to ongoing Russia-Ukraine war so far.

In particular, the Author would like to draw the readers’ attention to the Russian President Putin’s remarks in a joint press appearance with the US President Trump during the summit in Anchorage, Alaska, in August 2025, wherein he said that the understanding reached in that summit could be a foundation for restoring business relations between Russia and the US.

“I expect that today’s agreements will be the starting point not only for the solution of the Ukrainian issue, but also will help us bring back businesslike and pragmatic relations between Russia and the US,” Putin said at the time.