When President Barack Obama arrives in Moscow for a highly anticipated summit from July 6-8, he will find a U.S.-Russia business relationship that has barely taken off despite exceedingly hopeful beginnings 17 years ago after the breakup of the Soviet Union. Notwithstanding a few notable ventures, the U.S. is now only the eighth-largest foreign investor in Russia.

The summit is intended to activate what U.S. Vice-President Joe Biden called a "reset" of relations between the former superpower rivals after antagonism deepened during the latter two years or so of the George W. Bush Administration. Toward that end, Obama is scheduled to spend some 10 hours with Russian President Dmitry Medvedev in addition to a 90-minute breakfast with the country's ber-influential Prime Minister, Vladimir Putin.

While the Presidents are to initial agreements on arms control, transit of military supplies to Afghanistan, and nuclear energy, they also are supposed to drop by a simultaneous meeting of U.S. and Russian business leaders at Manezh Central Exhibition Hall. Yet on the business side, there is little sign of a thaw in the apprehensions of U.S. companies about the Russian investment environment.

Indeed, analysts say one of the main summit agenda items remains establishing a better atmosphere between the two countries. "It's far more important to clean up the atmosphere, to get rid of all those sticky fumes of anti-Americanism," said Pavel K. Baev, a research associate at the International Peace Research Institute in Oslo.

georgia is a major area of disagreement In recent weeks, Putin has welcomed investment by Shell (RDSA) and France's Total (TOT) in difficult natural gas fields. But energy companies are attentive to the recent experiences of BP (BP) and Exxon Mobil (XOM), both of which have longstanding investments in the country. Exxon Mobil, for instance, has continued to be thwarted in its plans to export natural gas to China from a major investment in the offshore Sakhalin-I field because Gazprom has insisted that the gas be sold at lower prices in Russia.

Russia's renewed need for investment capital amid its sharp recession may lessen the likelihood of such confrontations. "When times are not so good, the opportunities are there," said a senior executive at a major Western oil company with investments in Russia, who spoke not for attribution. "The nervousness you have is, what happens in three or four years' time, when the price of oil is back above $100 a barrel? When the price of oil goes back up, it's as high-risk as ever."

Energy's tight connection with foreign policy is one of the most stubborn points of conflict between the two countries.