Russian President Vladimir Putin on Monday denied having compromising information Donald Trump, claiming that the now-US commander-in-chief's political ambitions weren't on Russia's radar when the real estate mogul visited Moscow in 2013, and that "it would never occur to anyone that he would think of running for president."

Putin was confronted about having potentially damaging information on Trump during an interview with Fox News, and replied through an interpreter that "we don't have anything on them, and there can't be anything on them." He added that "before he announced that he will run for presidency, he was of no interest for us."

"He was a rich person, but well, there's plenty of rich persons in the United States," Putin said. "He was in the construction business. He organized the beauty pageants. But no, it would never occur to anyone that he would think of running for president. He never mentioned his political ambitions. It sounds like it's utter nonsense."

In January 2017, BuzzFeed News published a dossier compiled by a former British intelligence official — after former president Barack Obama and then-president-elect Trump were briefed on it — that said Russia had compromising information on Trump, in the form of a video that captured him in a Russian hotel room with prostitutes urinating on a bed.

Trump has denied the existence of the tape, and did so again Monday, saying, "If they had it, it would have been out long ago."

During the interview Monday, Putin also compared Trump to hundreds of other business leaders who visited Russia for an economic forum.

"Pretty much every one of them is a major industrial tycoon of greater scale than President Trump," Putin said. "Do you think that our Special Services actually organized surveillance on each and every of them? Well, unlike you, unlike the United States, we don't do this. We don't have enough resources. We don't have enough manpower to organize the total state of control. That's not part of our plans. And it's clear that we did nothing of that kind of against Mr. Trump."

Putin's claims Monday echo similar comments he made last year, when he told NBC's Megyn Kelly that rumors about Russia having compromising information on Trump were "just another load of nonsense."

However, earlier Monday Putin had not explicitly denied having compromising information on Trump when asked about it during a bizarre news conference in which the US commander-in-chief repeatedly bashed American citizens and at times defended his nation's top adversary.

"I did hear this rumor, that we allegedly collected compromising material on Mr. Trump when he was visiting Moscow [in 2013]," Putin said through a translator at a news conference after he and Trump met privately for more than two hours. "Let me tell you this, when President Trump was in Moscow back then, I didn't even know that he was in Moscow. I treat President Trump with utmost respect, but back then, when he was a private individual, a businessman, nobody informed me that he was in Moscow."

Putin then spoke in a hypothetical and referenced the same gathering of business leaders he mentioned during the Fox News interview.

"Let's take the St. Petersburg economic forum, for instance," he said. "There were over 500 American businessmen, high ranking, high-level ones. I don't even remember the last names of each and every one. Do you think that we try to collect compromising material on each and every single one of them? Well, it's difficult to imagine on a bigger scale than this. Please disregard these issues and don't think about this anymore again."

Earlier Monday, Democratic US Senator Jeff Merkley told BuzzFeed News that he thinks "something close to" the alleged video exists.

The news conference capped a highly anticipated private one-on-one meeting between Trump and Putin, which lasted more than two hours.

Trump came under heavy criticism from both the left and right for his answers during the news conference — one anchor on the president's favorite TV show, Fox and Friends, said he threw his "own people and country under the bus."

The day's most truly baffling statements came during the discussion about Russia's election meddling.

Trump again said he doubted Russia interfered with the 2016 presidential election — even though US intelligence services said that it was the case and special counsel Robert Mueller, who is investigating collusion between Trump's campaign and the Russian government, has levied charges that said as much. On Friday, a grand jury charged 12 Russian military officials with hacking Hillary Clinton's 2016 presidential campaign.

Asked outright whether Trump believed his own intelligence agencies or Putin on the question of interference into the US election, the president said, "He [Putin] just said it's not Russia. I will say this. I don't see any reason why it would be."

When asked if he wanted Trump to win the election, Putin said, "Yes, I did. Yes, I did. Because he talked about bringing the US–Russia relationship back to normal."

Trump also repeatedly slammed the FBI and Mueller's investigation — and FBI agent Peter Strzokin particular — as the real enemies.