Russian Economy General News: #8

Keep your enemies closer...

"Important position" could be everything, like "chairman of the presidential garden comission".

miketheterrible wrote:Be prepared for worstening of Russia's economy by magnitudes. Reports coming out Kudrin is to be appointed by Putin for an important position. If that is true, Russia is in big trouble.

"Putin may appoint Alexei Kudrin to high office in bid to improve relations with West."

Give it up now, the relations with the west will only improve if Putin hands over Crimea, gives up nuclear weapons and submits to the west. This is just idiotic.

https://en.crimerussia.com/gover/putin-may-appoint-alexei-kudrin-to-high-office-in-bid-to-improve-relations-with-west/


"President Vladimir Putin is considering whether to appoint a vice president for negotiating an end to sanctions with the US and the European Union (EU), and an about-turn in Russia’s foreign and defence policy.  

In the scheme proposed by former finance minister Alexei Kudrin (lead image, centre), the job would hold more power than the prime minister, allowing Dmitry Medvedev to remain in his place, but subordinate him to the new man.  Kudrin’s idea is that he would become this de facto vice president; the dominant policymaker of the government after Putin; and his likely successor.

Vice president is the term being used among Kremlin officials and advisors. Not since the constitutional crisis of 1993, when Vice President Alexander Rutskoi led the Russian parliament in rebellion against President Boris Yelstin, has the position of vice president existed in Russia, with the power to succeed or replace the incumbent president. It is an arrangement for which Kudrin claims to have the backing of the US and the EU.  Kudrin would also draw on the support of the Russian oligarchs, inside and outside the country.

The Kudrin scheme is being opposed as capitulation by the leadership of Russia’s defence, military and security forces. The Defence Minister, Sergei Shoigu, the chief of the General Staff, General Valery Gerasimov, the deputy prime minister in charge of the military-industrial complex, Dmitry Rogozin, and other senior officials have been trying to persuade Putin to appoint a new prime minister to fight the military, economic and information war which they believe the US intends to wage against Russia until the Kremlin accepts  the West’s terms. For the story of their Stavka, read this.  

These officials are fiercely opposed to Kudrin, and to his attempt to make an alliance with Medvedev to claim the legal succession to Putin, should Putin agree to relinquish the powers and policies against which the NATO powers have planned regime change.    

Igor Sechin, the chief executive of Rosneft and a presidential succession contender himself, is not in the running for the so-called vice presidency. Sources close to him say he is opposed to the ambitions of Kudrin and Medvedev but he is biding his time. As deputy chief of the Kremlin staff when Putin was president between 2000 and 2008, Sechin was the de facto vice president for domestic policy, and dwarfed Medvedev.

The Russian Constitution of December 1992 provided for a vice president as the second ranking official of the state. He was to be elected with the president on the same ticket, American style. The Constitution’s Article 121-7 said:  “The vice-president of the Russian Federation carries out his separate powers at the request of the President of the Russian Federation. The vice-president of the Russian Federation replaces the President of the Russian Federation in case of his absence.”

There has been only one – Alexander Rutskoi (right), a major-general in the Soviet Air Force and decorated combat veteran of the Afghan War. After he led the rebellion against Boris Yeltsin in 1993, he was suspended by Yeltsin in a decree the Constitutional Court ruled to be illegal. With a vote of parliament Rutskoi became acting president on September 22, 1993. Two weeks later he was defeated in the Yeltsin-ordered attack on the parliament building, and imprisoned. Yeltsin then arranged for a new constitution which was  ratified by a fraudulent referendum in December 1993. In the new Yeltsin charter the vice president’s post was erased. In its place, a subordinate prime minister, named by the president but not voted by a general election, was substituted.

Kudrin’s ambition to take power is so well-known, in September 2011 it brought him into open conflict with Medvedev, then president and hoping for a second term.  Kudrin declared his power grab in Washington. When he returned to Moscow, Medvedev gave him a tongue-lashing on television and sacked him. Putin, then the prime minister and intent on recovering the presidency for himself in 2012, defended Kudrin by saying “our very personal and my good friend” had suffered an “emotional breakdown”.

Three months later, at Putin’s national call-in television show, he was restored.  “Aleksei Leonidovich Kudrin has not left my team.  We are old comrades, he’s my friend. He did a lot for the country. I’m proud that this man worked in my government. Such people are needed and will be needed in current and future governments.”  The US state broadcaster RFE/RL headlined the rehabilitation: “Putin And Kudrin: Russia’s Real Tandem”.


Source: https://www.rferl.org/a/putin_kudrin_russias_real_tandem/24424519.html

Kudrin, a St. Petersburg economist with Putin in the mayoral administration of Anatoly Sobchak in the mid-1990s, has been Putin’s Svengali for austerity budgeting, privatization of state assets, and oligarch control of the economy for twenty years. His record for enriching himself has been attested by sources inside Alrosa, the state diamond miner, whose board Kudrin controlled when he was finance minister.  Start reading the backfile here.

Last week Kudrin advertised his readiness for promotion to Putin’s official deputy, briefing the press on his proposals for “a fair parity — after six years of growth in unproductive spending, move to a six-year increase in productive spending.” Kudrin meant six years since his dismissal from office. He also means to implement sharp cuts in defence spending, and a policy of withdrawal from the Ukraine and Syrian fronts on the terms demanded by Washington.  He favours a massive sell-off of state assets to the oligarchs, whose capital export Kudrin has long protected, and whose bailout by the state banks Kudrin directed in 2008 with his longtime ally, German Gref (lead image, 2nd from left), chief executive of Sberbank.   When Kudrin uses the word reform, he means a privatization of the state’s assets to the oligarchs, and nationalization of the oligarchs’ losses and liabilities.

Last week too, Kudrin advertised that he and Medvedev had met for a discussion, which the prime minister’s spokesman characterised as focusing on “his proposals on improving the system of public administration.” In fact, they discussed how to form a united front in the bidding for Putin’s decision.  

To show Putin he has the support of the anti-Russian alliance in the West, Kudrin arranged for the Financial Times to report yesterday that his promotion is a near certainty."

http://johnhelmer.org/?p=17717#more-17717




Is Putin really this stupid.

Arrow wrote:Liberals are becoming more and more powerful in Russia. This is the beginning of the end of strong Russia. Putin is crazy that he gives a high position to Kurdin

and has he given him anything yet?! or you rely on TImes souce

miketheterrible wrote:Be prepared for worstening of Russia's economy by magnitudes. Reports coming out Kudrin is to be appointed by Putin for an important position. If that is true, Russia is in big trouble.

I am dont like  Kudrin as big ego for western liberast. But  he often talks about important however socially important things. Loke retirement age, investment into human capital.

Firebird wrote:I've skimmed through this thread occasionally and noted that there seems to be a lot of anti-Kudrin/anti-Central bank feeling. Criticism of interest rate setting and the holding of US Treasuries. But overall, can someone explain why they think Kudrin and co are complete dogshit?

I live in the West, I'm involved in finance and the markets. But I'm very pro-Russia and pro-Putin and Eurasianism, being of Russian descent.

Most of  folks here dont like monetarist liberal politics. And ideology that assumes that without western technologies and investment Russia cannot go on ? This is one step from capitulation and endangers own Russia's existence...

Hole wrote:Keep your enemies closer...
"Important position" could be everything, like "chairman of the presidential garden comission".

That woudl sound as best possible options there is other option IMHO a bad cop to be hated for necessary but very unpopular decisions (retirement age? relasing 30% of state apparatus? ).It would be dangerous tho to let him capitulate Russia ...

"Putin may appoint Alexei Kudrin to high office in bid to improve relations with West."

If Putin pushes through with that then he is indeed a senile incompetent fool who needs to be replaced asap. At first I was skeptical about Vann's rantings against Putin, but now Putin is starting to act very carelessly, I really hope this is just for show, a sort of trap for the west. I will keep on hoping for the best.

China, Russia,  N. Korea and I guess soon Iran, attempt an attack of friendship. They don't seem to have that much of a problem, they must be into something.

PS All included, Kudrin is not a bad economist.

Project Canada wrote:

"Putin may appoint Alexei Kudrin to high office in bid to improve relations with West."

If Putin pushes through with that then he is indeed a senile incompetent fool who needs to be replaced asap. At first I was skeptical about Vann's rantings against Putin, but now Putin is starting to act very carelessly, I really hope this is just for show, a sort of trap for the west. I will keep on hoping for the best.

I was also very skeptical about Vann's rants and thought he was just making up crap(sorry Vann and God bless you.) This is just crazy, what is the plan behind this?


PAUL CRAIG ROBERTS: “DOES RUSSIA KNOW WHAT’S UP?

"I find myself wondering if Russia understands the Washington criminal with whom Russia is so desperate to negotiate peace and understanding.

Russian Foreign Minister Lavrov is excited that Trump has invited Putin to the White House “to jointly curb the arms race.” https://www.rt.com/news/425699-lavrov-trump-meet-putin/

Of course the US military/security complex wants to curb an arms race in which Russia is 30 years ahead. Will the Russian government in all its delusions and romanticized view of the US and its vassals again be sucked into meaningless agreements that leave Russia exposed to annihilation?

How can Russia expect any agreement with Washington or any European country to mean anything when in front of Russia’s very eyes the US, alone in the world, is breaking the agreement the US made with Iran with regard to Iran’s enrichment of uranium? https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fYOnXL6R-B8&feature=youtu.be

Why does Lavrov want to negotiate another agreement with Washington that Washington will break as it has every other negotiated agreement with Russia since the Clinton regime. Does the Russian Foreign Ministry find it difficult to learn from experience?

Russia has the winning hand, but does not know how to play it. The caution with which the government operates encourages more provocations, whereas a more decisive policy would discourage provocations.

Washington interprets Russia’s conciliatory behavior as weakness, and now also so does the tiny country of Israel. Believe it or not, Israel has issued an ultimatum to Russia. Israel, a country so small that it can be wiped out by conventional weapons alone has now ordered the world’s primary military power to get out of the way of Israel’s illegal military attacks on Syria. http://www.investmentwatchblog.com/israeli-defense-minister-asks-russia-to-stand-down-syria-air-defenses-or-they-will-be-attacked-too/

A country that can be given an ultimatum by Israel, whose army was twice routed and utterly defeated by a small Lebanese militia, has no respect in the West. This is Russia’s problem. Even the militarily impotent British talk about going to war with Russia as if that is a riskless undertaking.

As long as the Russian government conveys indecisiveness and weakness in its responses to extreme provocations, the provocations will continue to push the world to World War 3."

https://southfront.org/paul-craig-roberts-does-russia-know-whats-up/

As american Mr. Roberts should work to replace the current Regime (deep state) in his own country.

The source of the Kudrin return is close to american propaganda/regime media.

Putin has a record doing disastrous and patently stupid actions. Best example is appointment of Kudrin's protege Nabiullina  as a head of CBR. Doing something as colossally retarded as handing power to shitstain traitor Kudrin is not something entirely impossible.

If that transpires Russia is pretty much fucked. We are talking about early 90s stile collapse and mass looting of national wealth, another massive drop in living standard and life expectancy, hiperausterity ending of all state development programs, science programs, social development program, defence industry programs, and violent prosecution and liquidation of opponents of US imperialism and advocates of Russia's sovereignty like Yeltsin did in 1993 when he sent army to murder his political opponents.

As american Mr. Roberts should work to replace the current Regime (deep state) in his own country.

Why do you attack the messenger? Roberts is 100% right in his assessment, and your response sounds as self delusional deflection of partisan fan boy.

Firebird wrote:Oh and that poster also said that Russia should be run by a GERMAN!!

Nazi propaganda and ideology should be and is not acceptable. Regardless on nationality. Germans especially today have nothing to do with Nazism.

Moving on, Putin plays the best hand he can with the cards he's dealt. He might be patient, biding his time for whatever action is needed. But patience should never be confused with weakness. Ofcourse some things are frustrating, but even Stalin had to tolerate or fight resistance in some areas, right up until the Great Patriotic War. Big matters can't be solved overnight. Especially after the idiocy of Yeltsin and Gorbachev.

+1000

ZoA wrote:Putin has a record doing disastrous and patently stupid actions. Best example is appointment of Kudrin's protege Nabiullina  as a head of CBR. Doing something as colossally retarded as handing power to shitstain traitor Kudrin is not something entirely impossible.

Cannot agree with you. As Firebird said Putin plays cards he has. Or if you prefer Bismarck: "Politics is the art of possible". Stabilizing economy with stopping inflation (as Delyagin referred) is like spal to a face when somebody is getting hysteric. it is right way and it works. However if this is getting the only way to keep family relations it is not gonna last long.

CBR stopped flow of money to economy - why? because in "leaky" banking system , corrupted governments of all levels just wasted most of it! lo at analysis in 2009 most of billions of USD pumped into economy was sent to speculations or offshore. Pumping money into economy is cool if economy can make use of it.

What would happen in 2014 is billions would be pumped? transferred abroad? spent on imported goods (as Russian companies didn't started many developments yet)? What I cn see Putin tries to first balance budget ~ not to live beyond won means. Liberalize legal framework of economy and introduce "lean " stat management then pump money to economy.

Look what happened in liberal media: Putin increased minimal salary in Russia. Couple of billions (50blns rub rubles - around 750 mln usd) were pumped into economy in the right way. Social issues and customer base was addressed in one shot.

Kudrin may be making a lot of noise cause that is what he usually does. But I have read in recent past his statements on things and noticed he really does end up breaking down to agreeing with current structure. But still insists to praise the west...

If he had a position of advising the president, then it's not bad. So long as the other guy gets to keep the same job.

The Central Bank will transfer the payment transfer system to the block system in 2019

https://iz.ru/739235/2018-05-04/tcentrobank-perevedet-peredachu-platezhei-na-blokchein-v-2019-godu

The Central Bank plans to transfer the Financial Communications Transfer System (FFS) to the block system in 2019. This was reported to Izvestia by a source close to the Bank of Russia, as well as two bankers familiar with the situation.

It is assumed that the blocker will raise the level of protection of financial transactions and ensure their maximum transparency: data from the distributed registry can not be deleted, and the information will be updated automatically. Such a measure will significantly increase interest in the Russian equivalent of SWIFT, which is the system.

"The use of blocking technology will undoubtedly increase the level of protection of SFFS in relation to hacker attacks. This is especially true given the fact that a number of banks, including the Russian Globex, have been victims of hacker attacks through the SWIFT system, "says Maxim Osadchy, head of the analytical department at BKF Bank.

As reported in the press service of the Central Bank, the cost of one message through the FFS is about 1.5-2 rubles, while the tariff for transmission through SWIFT varies in the region of € 0.03-0.05.

However, it is not yet known whether the Bank of Russia will use its own development on the block-chain or the existing Ethereum platform for SFFS.

Hole wrote:Yup. All this guys that scream "he showed weakness in syria because he didn´t start WWIII after the three western stooges pissed on the garden hut" should take up a gun and go to eastern syria to fight against the ami. Let the rest of us live.

admit it - we're just woosies, or if you were Austrian winnies

"Russia: Washington’s Next Vassal?"

"If reports coming out of Russia are true, Vladimir Putin is considering appointing Washington’s agent, Alexei Kudrin, to negotiate Russia’s surrender to Washington. See this and this.

In checking out this story with well-informed and connected experts, I am advised that John Helmer in his report might have put too much credence in the story planted on the Financial Times by Kudrin. One expert whose judgment I trust told me that Kudrin and other members of the “pro-US lobby”—the traitors that The Saker calls the Atlanticist Integrationists—are playing their usual games. Kudrin may have gone too far this time by planting the story in the UK’s Financial times of his forthcoming appointment as negotiator of Russia’s surrender to Washington. The expert, whom I trust, told me that everyone in the Putin administration really dislikes Kudrin as a person and political figure — the sly games he plays, exploiting Putin’s personal loyalty from the past. It is widely said in Russia that Putin is too loyal to old friends like Kudrin who no longer serve him well. Kudrin’s few allies are in Medvedev’s group, and Washington’s incompetence recently sanctioned a couple of Kudrin’s Russian allies.

Another expert whom I trust responds that rumors fly in Russia like they do everywhere as ambitious people jocky to elevate themselves in the media. In contrast to the rumors that Putin is going to turn Russia’s fate over to an American agent, he reports rumors that Putin, pushed by nationalist patriotism and the military, is about to purge the Russian Fifth Column—Kudrin and the pro-Washington faction.

On the other hand, a Russian journalist tells me that in actual fact Putin himself is the biggest pro-Western liberal of them all and that Kudrin was instrumental in bringing Putin from St. Petersburg and installing him in the Moscow establishment.

Perhaps Putin’s inaugural address will indicate whether Kudrin will be given the power to surrender Russia or whether the pro-American Fifth Column will be finally excluded from the government or whether nothing changes.

Kudrin sounds like a traitor who should be put on trial for treason. It seems unlikely that Putin would make Kudrin the number two man in the Russian government. Kudrin, a protector of oligarchic control of Russia by billionaires who stole their fortunes by “privatizing” public assets, is also known for his advocacy of austerity for the Russian population while creating more billionaires by privatizing state assets.

Possibly there is as much fake news in Russia as there is in the US and Europe and that the truth is that Kudrin is a nonentity and not a player in Russian government decisions. However, if Kudrin is elevated, perhaps his rise is due to neoliberal economics.

Kudrin along with the Russian central bank and most Russian economists who have been brainwashed by American neoliberal economics—“junk economics” in Michael Hudson’s accurate characterization—believe that the success of Russia’s economy depends on being tied to Washington’s imperial system. They believe—very erroneously and quite stupidly—that without American investment and the lifting of the sanctions, the Russian economy is doomed. That is what they say. The case could be that, like global economic interests everywhere, the oligarchs are only concerned with money, not with their country’s sovereignty.

As Michael Hudson and I have pointed out, the neoliberal economics taught to Russians by Americans in effect makes Russian economists agents of the West. The Russian economists represent policies that work to Washington’s, not to Russia’s, interest. Pepe Escobar, who believes Putin is moving in the opposite direction from Kudrin, acknowledges the pro-Washington faction’s control over Russian economic and financial policy. See this.

As there are few economists to tell Putin any different, the Russian government receives advice that Russia will fail unless its economy is integrated with the West.

Kudrin also intends to cut Russia’s military capability in order to save money with which to pay interest on foreign loans that oligarchs will use to privatize public assets. The consequence would be to make Russia’s vassalage permanent as a colony of the West.

In my article on May 3, I asked if Russia knows what’s up. Apparently not in the Middle East. The Russian government thinks Syria is about fighting terrorism and working out a peaceful settlement. But this is the last thing that Washington and Israel want. Washington and Israel want Assad and Iran overthrown so that Hezbollah is left without support and Israel can occupy southern Lebanon. Perhaps the Russian government’s inability to decipher the situation is the reason that Russia, always hoping to involve Washington in a peace settlement, never decisively brought the war in Syria to an end. Now Russia is faced with US, French, and British forces in the American-occupied part of Syria and with Israeli military attacks on Syrian army positions.

If Kudrin is permitted to put Russia under Washington’s control, China, whose government also seems impervious to the real situation that it confronts, will stand alone. By privatizing state assets and creating billionaire oligarchs more loyal to money than to China, the Chinese government has created levers for Washington to use to neutralize China.

Even if Helmer’s report is true, Washington and its ally Kudrin might still fail for any number of reasons, including the mounting problems of the US. Nevertheless, that Putin is reportedly considering endorsing Kudrin and his surrender policy is an indication that Russians face a challenge to their sovereignty from the pro-American forces in Russia."

https://www.globalresearch.ca/russia-washingtons-next-vassal/5639378

par far wrote: that Putin is reportedly considering endorsing Kudrin and his surrender policy

reportedly this was reported by Financial Times Indeed FT must have been in Putin's head and knew in advance what is he planning an why.

https://www.ft.com/content/c1721646-4d51-11e8-8a8e-22951a2d8493

GarryB wrote:
And why do you think that Russia is so rich and powerful it can ignore the international economy and do what it wants the way the US does?
Do you really think the Russians can do anything they like and get away with it?

+1000

Well it would be interesting to see timeline of correlation of military strength ( I mean all new equipment, training, motivation and so on) , economic strength, people's mood, demographic parameters and own media strength.

Because we dont know and ( never learn as well about thousands of behind-closed-doors parameters, blackmail, negotiations we dont add them but I am sure they do count.

Right now they have an alternative to SWIFT, and they are at the point where they are probably strong enough to do a lot of things they would have been crushed for doing even just 10 years ago.

After II WW the world's economy has been built around Brenton Woods conference and Washington Consensus. I presume all Putin's critics know about it right?
Look Russia in 90's was about to fall apart, demographic indicators were alarming. That was planned by US elites. But shit! Putin came.

It is hard to underestimate how GREAT job has been done so far.