• by Laurie Sullivan  @lauriesullivan, March 1, 2022

Russian search engine Yandex is taking a beating from western companies as the country's president, Vladimir Putin, continues to use its military in an attempt to overthrow the Ukrainian government. 

The New York Stock Exchange halted trading of Yandex stock Monday on the Nasdaq, but not before shares fell 21% to $14.90 in premarket trading.

Uber also removed three of its executives from the board of a joint venture ride-share company, Yandex.Taxi, as more major western executives continue to distance the corporations they represent from Russia since its invasion of Ukraine. 

"In August 2021, we divested a significant portion of our stake in our joint venture with Yandex and agreed to a process to divest the rest," the statement said. "In light of recent events, we are actively looking for opportunities to accelerate the sale of our remaining holdings and, in the meantime, will remove our executives from the board of the joint venture."

Uber owns a 29% stake in Yandex's ride-sharing and car-sharing business. As of December 2021, Yandex gained an American call option to acquire that stake from Uber for around $2 billion if exercised in September 2023.

Lithuania also has asked Google and Apple to remove the ride-sharing app for the Yandex.taxi ride-hailing service, Reuters reports, citing the transport and economy ministers.

The decision aligns with similar moves made by Google, and Apple. As a result of Western sanctions, customers of Sovcombank, VTB, Otkritie, Promsvyazbank and Novikombank credit institutions cannot use Google Pay and Apple Pay services, the Bank of Russia announced earlier this week.

Netflix also cut ties with Russia due to its invasion of Ukraine. It now refuses to carry state-owned TV channels. The streaming service confirmed to Variety that it wouldn't carry the 20 free state channels required under a Russian law, including Channel One, NTV and Spa. The company has "no plans" to carry the content because of the "current situation," Variety reports, citing a spokesperson.