Russia and economic war by the west #3

India may end up replacing Europe as the main hub for Diamonds as they are the main cutters as it is.

The main issue is the market for jewerly diamonds in terms of final customers is basically Western countries. So they can just demand the diamonds come from this or that source. What will happen is a lot of smuggling where diamonds are replaced with Russian diamonds while being passed as something else.

This business is led by Amsterdam based Jewish tycoons.
And is one of the less moral existing, dealing with bloody diamonds forever.
Embarging on Russian-originated supply, when it can be sold by middlemen from any country, is a joke.

The main issue is the market for jewerly diamonds in terms of final customers is basically Western countries. So they can just demand the diamonds come from this or that source.

Will they though?

How many rich people buy diamonds for men?

How many women could care less where her diamonds came from?

What rich person is going to refuse Indian sourced diamonds that are 20% cheaper than diamonds from Europe?

India and South Africa and Russia and China might get together as part of BRICS and set something up between themselves...

You need the raw material but most of the value is in the cutting...

This is good news... sad it took so long though:



Also this:

The EU has found extra-budgetary funds for Ukraine, by Gevorg Mirzayan for RTRUSSIAN. 02.20.2024.

The European Union has taken the first step towards confiscation of frozen Russian assets. The European Commission has finally approved a scheme under which income from frozen Russian deposits (that is, several billion euros) is withdrawn and subsequently used for the so-called restoration of Ukraine. “We have made it clear that these incomes, these windfalls, do not relate to Russian assets. We can take this income and invest it, for example, in the production of weapons for Ukraine. Thus, we can provide support to Ukraine directly from income or windfall from Russian assets,” said the head of the European Commission, Ursula von der Leyen.

The logic of European officials is obvious. The United States demands that it play first fiddle in financing the Kyiv regime. During the election campaign, it will be very difficult for Joseph Biden to allocate money to Ukraine, and without financial support, Zelensky will very quickly lose the war, after which Biden will lose the November elections.

Actually, Ursula von der Leyen and the European Commission don’t really need to be asked here: faithful daughters of the global ultra-liberal order, they place the interests of this order much higher than the interests of the national European states that they seem to govern. And the main interest of order now is survival, for which it is necessary to prevent Russia’s triumph in Ukraine by any means. That is, in a situation where the negotiation process with Moscow is considered an absolute heresy, to finance and arm Ukraine to the limit. In the hope that Russia will somehow miraculously collapse.

However, the problem is that the fanaticism of European officials is met with a banal lack of money. In order to cover the shortfall in American funding, the EU must double its funding for the Kyiv regime, and it will be extremely difficult to convince the European Commission to maintain it even at the current level. Especially against the backdrop of a falling standard of living in Europe and the beginning of mass protests by the population (take the same farmers' riots). The controversy and conflict surrounding the adoption of a four-year aid program for the Kiev regime showed that a number of national leaders (the most vocal, but not the most influential of whom was Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orbán) would either oppose the allocation or try to blackmail the EU with a veto, which leads to the imbalance of the entire management system in the European Union.

And to ensure that the Kyiv regime continues to receive financial support without falling victim to internal unrest, Europe needs to find extra-budgetary funding. And not by millions, but by billions of euros. And the only such source was frozen Russian state assets, 2/3 of which (that is, almost €200 billion) were located on the territory of the European Union.

Yes, it’s impossible to just take them away. To do this, Russia must either declare war on EU member countries, or these countries must not recognize the current Russian government (and therefore its ownership of this money), or Moscow itself must allow the use of frozen funds to help Ukraine. None of these conditions are met, which means that the funds themselves cannot be seized. Yes, the EU can steal them through the thesis of “fair punishment” of Russia, but this decision will not find understanding among the eastern countries, which also store hundreds of billions of euros in Europe. They keep them because they are confident in their integrity. And if this confidence disappears, then this money will also disappear from European jurisdiction.

Therefore, Brussels is trying to find any legal grounds to take away at least something. Actually, he believes that he has already found it - in the form of confiscation of interest.

Moreover, you need to understand that this confiscation is only the first step, and other measures will follow. For example, allowing Ukraine to take out loans secured by frozen Russian assets (which, they say, will one day be confiscated). It is clear that this is a fraud. It is clear that interest rates will be very high (since the guarantor is, after all, someone else’s property). However, Kyiv doesn’t care: it won’t give this money back. He will simply offer creditors to take Russian “collateral”, after which they will have to go to court and try to win this money for themselves.

In Moscow, meanwhile, they are talking about the consequences for Brussels. First of all, legal ones. “We will pursue legally all those who are involved in such decisions... and their implementation. Russia will defend its interests,” said Vladimir Putin’s press secretary Dmitry Peskov.

Yes, it is useless to pursue Frau von der Leyen legally, but Moscow goes further. Russian officials say that they will respond with confiscation to confiscation, that is, take away property on the territory of the Russian Federation. There are, however, two important points here. Firstly, the lion's share of Russian money lies in Belgium, and there are not hundreds of billions of dollars worth of Belgian property in Russia. In addition - and this is secondly - state property. After all, if we talk about a symmetrical response, then the confiscation of state assets must be responded to with the confiscation of state assets.

Therefore, it would be logical for an asymmetrical response to follow - and this is where von der Leyen comes to the rescue. Since the decision to confiscate money in Belgium is made at the level of the European Union, the response decision should not concern Belgian property, but that which belongs to all EU countries. And not only public, but also private - that is, all European Union investments in Russia.

Yes, it seems that this will not be entirely legal, but Moscow may well pull off the Brussels trick. Nationalize all property of EU citizens on the territory of the Russian Federation and pay them compensation from those same Russian frozen assets.

And then let European citizens go to their European courts for these euros.

https://russian.rt.com/opinion/1275456-mirzayan-rossiya-es-aktivy-dengi-ukraina

During the election campaign, it will be very difficult for Joseph Biden to allocate money to Ukraine, and without financial support, Zelensky will very quickly lose the war, after which Biden will lose the November elections.

Problem there is that Ukraine seems to be losing the war anyway, and F-16s are not going to change anything.

Therefore, it would be logical for an asymmetrical response to follow - and this is where von der Leyen comes to the rescue. Since the decision to confiscate money in Belgium is made at the level of the European Union, the response decision should not concern Belgian property, but that which belongs to all EU countries. And not only public, but also private - that is, all European Union investments in Russia.

But it is clearly not just an EU decision... this was driven through the G7 by the US, so EU, US, and G7 assets should all be targeted and seized... and their assets should be massively undervalued so Russia can be sure to get full compensation.

To put that in context if the US seized two Russian tanks and Russia returned the favour and seized two US tanks, the Russians would have the number of tanks in their possession as the US does, but the value of the US tanks.... no... the price paid for the US tanks will be much higher than what the Russians paid for those Russian tanks.

The fact that the US was overcharged for those heaps of shit is not Russias problem.

It will have some effect. For few months. It will force Chinese, Indian and other countries who have these deals with Russia to open new shell companies to be able to still do the trading.

They may also move to a more secure way of trading where it isn't easy to see how the money is moved. I mean they are using their own version of swift for this.

This isn't first time US and EU pulled this shit.

Well it should be interesting because I would expect Chinese and Indian governments to at the very least push back at any western country that tries to follow through on these sanctions, because technically they are illegal without the endorsement of the UNSC.

They are a unilateral sanction which has no standing in international law.

I think we will have to wait to see if they actually bother to impose the sanctions or just pay lip service and hope these companies comply in fear of potential action now the laws are on the books.

A certain amount of blowback and China and India responding to western sanctions with sanctions of their own would be an interesting development... especially as the US is trying to separate and divide Russia and China and India... it might just push them closer together and to work harder to separate themselves from the west.

(well the Russians are being pushed away by the west, but the west certainly does not want to abandon or isolate itself from the enormous markets of China and India.)

Retarded article as expected from the FT:
https://www.ft.com/content/0df913c7-aec2-471f-82e8-8d1398f7ab9f

Why didn’t the G7 and EU sanction all Russian banks? That would be equivalent to a trade embargo (prohibition of exports), since countries would no longer be able to pay Russia for its fossil fuel exports (oil, gas and coal), bringing those exports to a halt. Russia exports about 8mn barrels of oil, on average, per day. How to squeeze Putin’s revenue without driving up the price of oil sharply?

No it would not be a trade embargo you retards. Ever heard of bartering? Ever heard of using alternatives to SWIFT for bank payments? Like using corresponding accounts? Idiots.

In December 2022, the G7 and EU found an ingenious way forward, imposing a cap on the price that Russia can receive for its crude oil exports when these are transported in western-owned ships or use western services. In early 2023, a roughly equivalent cap was extended to cover refined products. Unfortunately, implementation of this oil price cap was at every turn undercut by a small number of western operators, especially Greek shipping magnates, that sold their oil tankers to “undisclosed” buyers — allowing Russia to export oil outside the cap.

Yeah real genius. Russia has oil to sell, and you don't want to transport it, so they just get their own ships. You don't insure their ships, so they make their own insurance scheme. How totally not expected... And I am sure those Greek shippers would love to keep their oil tanker ships when they don't have any oil to carry with them.

To be fair, the Greeks are not alone. The massive rise in western exports to central Asia and the Caucasus is another example of western business at work. For example, German exports of cars and parts to Kyrgyzstan have risen 5,000 per cent since Russia’s invasion of Ukraine. There is no way these exports are staying in Kyrgyzstan. They are going to Russia, where they help keep the war economy going, and the same thing is happening via Belarus, Kazakhstan and other places.

Yes I am fairly sure that the German civilian car parts being imported are used in Russia's war effort. Not.

keep the war economy going,

Wonder how he would react if in response Russia confiscated BP's and other UK companies assets in Russia, so reducing UK corporation tax revenue. As they surely would.

Western countries must become bolder in the issue of confiscating frozen Russian assets in favor of Ukraine, British Prime Minister Rishi Sunak said in an opinion piece for The Sunday Times.

In his opinion, the West should first of all confiscate in favor of Ukraine the significant interest that these funds have brought in since the moment of freezing.

In the future, Sunak calls on the G7 countries to find ways to seize the assets themselves for their transfer to Kiev. - FRWL reports

Why didn’t the G7 and EU sanction all Russian banks? That would be equivalent to a trade embargo (prohibition of exports), since countries would no longer be able to pay Russia for its fossil fuel exports (oil, gas and coal), bringing those exports to a halt. Russia exports about 8mn barrels of oil, on average, per day. How to squeeze Putin’s revenue without driving up the price of oil sharply?

What they mean when they say this is:

Why didn’t the G7 and EU sanction all Russian banks? That would be equivalent to a trade embargo (prohibition of exports), since western countries would no longer be able to pay Russia for its fossil fuel exports (oil, gas and coal), bringing those exports to a halt. Russia exports about 8mn barrels of oil, on average, per day. How to squeeze Putin’s revenue without driving up the price of oil sharply?

It is western countries that can't trade with Russia without banks because to get the energy and resources they need they have to pay cash because delivering high tech western stuff would help Russia develop and grow too much...

They are only powerful because of all the western technology they are using obviously...

Yeah real genius. Russia has oil to sell, and you don't want to transport it, so they just get their own ships. You don't insure their ships, so they make their own insurance scheme. How totally not expected... And I am sure those Greek shippers would love to keep their oil tanker ships when they don't have any oil to carry with them.

The brilliant oil cap scheme has allowed Russia to develop its own fleet to export its products... and if it so chooses those ships can sail past western ports where Russian products are not welcome, to ports in the rest of the world where the market is keen to buy cheaper Russian energy...

Even as the price of Russian oil and gas goes up it is still generally the cheapest on the market.

There is no way these exports are staying in Kyrgyzstan. They are going to Russia, where they help keep the war economy going, and the same thing is happening via Belarus, Kazakhstan and other places.

They bypass western sanctions and make the west look weak and stupid... and petty.

Always money to be made in times of war.

Wonder how he would react if in response Russia confiscated BP's and other UK companies assets in Russia, so reducing UK corporation tax revenue. As they surely would.

I suspect that is one of the things they might do when the west gets around to stealing what they have frozen...

Western countries must become bolder in the issue of confiscating frozen Russian assets in favor of Ukraine, British Prime Minister Rishi Sunak said in an opinion piece for The Sunday Times.

He must be the best prime minister the UK has ever had for sure...


Money will win this war... it is why the US has no problems at all anywhere, because they spend more than any other country or group of countries on war so they are perfectly safe from war... and common sense.

Would be interesting to see a breakdown of what all this money will be used for that is going to win the conflict for Kiev.

Borrell has been talking about this conflict only lasting a few more months now and that funding Kiev is critical to them winning.

These guys are idiots.

Moscow. February 27. INTERFAX - The number of Russian individuals and companies under sanctions from at least one of the main Western initiating countries, as a result of the next round of restrictive measures, has exceeded 6 thousand. At the moment it is 6063 compared to about 1000 as of February 20, 2022 and 5444 at the end of last year, according to statistics from the X-Compliance system.
Since the beginning of 2024, the United States and its allies have already taken 1,019 sanctions measures against Russian individuals and legal entities, including 964 in the short period from February 22 to 25. In particular, 488 Russian individuals were included in the American lists, which is a record figure for one day, in Canada - 161, in Europe - 151, in Australia - 86.
In addition, Western countries began to increasingly actively impose sanctions against companies from third countries suspected of violating restrictive measures against Russia. According to statistics from the X-Compliance system, in total, the US, EU and UK imposed 483 sanctions against foreign companies under programs related to anti-Russian measures for the period from 2022 to 2024. Most often these are companies from the UAE, Cyprus, China, and Turkey.
The European Union, which in 2021 did not impose sanctions against companies from third countries as part of anti-Russian measures, introduced secondary sanctions against 8 companies in 2022, 21 in 2023, and against 16 from the beginning of 2024. The list includes 13- The third package of sanctions included organizations from such jurisdictions as India, Sri Lanka, China, Hong Kong, Turkey, Kazakhstan, Serbia, Thailand, Belarus and the DPRK.
X-Compliance's regular sanctions statistics take into account 11 major foreign sanctions lists, including the US, EU, UK, Switzerland, Poland, Canada, Japan and Australia.
X-Compliance is a compliance risk management service created by specialists from the Interfax group. According to a survey by the National Financial Market Council, 63% of financial organizations use X-Compliance, in particular, to comply with Russian counter-sanctions.

https://www-militarynews-ru.translate.goog/story.asp?rid=1&nid=612361&lang=RU&_x_tr_sl=ru&_x_tr_tl=en&_x_tr_hl=en&_x_tr_pto=wapp

Soon the Rest of the World will decide that it´s better not to do business with the west.

By pushing Russia and to a lessor extent India and China away, the west is killing the golden goose... the west made an enormous amount of money from shipping Russian oil and buying cheap energy from Russia keeping their production costs down to make their profit margin higher.

Their goods tended to be more expensive, but they still sold on quality, but the loss of cheap energy means they are going to become prohibitively expensive and the quality is likely to collapse as they find ways to reduce costs.

Putin could never have gotten Russians to reject the west... many people find the idea of the west rather appealing... and it is as long as you focus on what they say rather than what they do, or have done.

The western market is a lake with the biggest sharks in the world and trying to operate in that lake means coming across those sharks over and over again... and you never win against those giant sharks and they are very careful to kill off any fish that start to get too big because they say competition is the basis of democracy and free market economy, but in fact they hate competition and will do anything to prevent real competition from hurting their bottom line.

The west has pushed Russia down the river to the sea and adaptation has not been easier, but ironically that lake was more salty than the open ocean.

The west is a mature economy that is dominated by fake intangible economics so when everyone is trapped at home for a year the GDP really does not change very much because it is all smoke and mirrors.

Growing economies in the rest of the world offer an enormous prospect for growth and development and there is rather more money to be made there than there ever was in the so called rich west.

The west is rich because they are greedy thieving bastards... you will never get rich trading with rich greedy bastards.

The trickle down myth where rich people have to spend money to live so the people around them get richer over time is a myth.

Rich people hoard their money and don't share with anyone... it is how they got rich and how they stay rich.

The west is doing Russia a favour by rejecting them, and I hope Russians realise they are doing this out of spite and fear that Russia is developing and growing so fast and has so many untapped resources under their control that their future looks rather bright.

Almost nothing can stop the flow of money in commerce. Where there is a will there is always a way.

Zlatti71
@djuric_zlatko
Former leading economist at the Institute of International Finance (IIF) Robin Brooks showed the scale of exports from the EU to Belarus and Central Asian countries

“Poland’s exports to Belarus reached a new historical high in December 23. It doesn't take a rocket scientist to know this thing is coming to Russia," Brooks wrote.

The financier also points out that exports from the EU increased by $1.3 billion per month compared to the period before the conflict in Ukraine. - Ostashko reports

Biz talks, bullshit walks. So very happy to see that Belarus is making the most out of the situation. In way the EU is already paying for Belarus to reach Russian standards of development before the eventual reunification. Very cool!

Moron bashes the EU but stays silent on the US increasing imports from Russia in important areas.

Moron ignores the fact that the west thought sanctions on Russia would be devastating because they have no alternative to trade with the west.

Russia has broken the sanctions by buying from neighbours to bypass the sanctions... but more importantly they are shifting their trade to the east and south away from the west so pretty soon that black market stuff going through third party countries is going to dry up because they have found another source of that product that is not from the EU.

Do you think these EU countries knowingly bypassing their own countries sanctions are also looking for other trade options around the world?

I rather suspect these European countries are so full of themselves and think when this conflict ends the sanctions will be dropped and they can return to normal trade with Russia.

I honestly can't see that happening because when Kiev collapses and Russia moves in and occupies the whole country while referendums are set up and the west gets no say at all over what happens in that former country that the US and the EU are going to have a collective hissy fit and claim all actions are illegal and null and void and they wont accept them...

And Russia will reply who cares? You weren't interested in negotiating an agreement before the conflict on security in Europe, why would we bother talking to you now about it?

Let them spend their economies into the ground building up military forces to defend themselves from Baba Yaga.

Shift of policy for Finland in regard to neutrality regarding Russia is having economic effects for Finland it seems.

UnionPay Struggles in Russia Amid Sanctions, Huawei Pay Transactions Halted

https://bnnbreaking.com/finance-nav/unionpay-struggles-in-russia-amid-sanctions-huawei-pay-transactions-halted

I'm not sure why some Chinese companies (especially Huawei) are following Western sanctions against Russia when the West made efforts to sanction numerous Chinese companies in the past.

Russia needs to learn from such incidents and continue to build up its own domestic payment system like the Mir.