Pricing remains an issue, but negotiations expected to be completed soon

Russia and China are highly likely to nail down a natural gas deal during Russian President Vladimir Putin's visit to Beijing in May after years of negotiations, experts from both sides said on Tuesday.

Sergey Pikin, director of Russia's Energy Development Fund, was optimistic about the deal, saying during a video interview that it's "100 percent" possible that a bilateral agreement will be signed next month. However, Alexy Belogoriev, deputy director-general of the Institute of Energy Strategy in Russia, put the possibility at 50 percent. He said that even if the deal doesn't happen during Putin's visit, it might be finished by this autumn.