Russia and economic war by the west #2

lancelot wrote:
The two countries with the largest diamond cutting industries in the world are India and China so.
Europe used to be the center of the diamond cutting business but that has not been true for many years already.

Yup, but the supply is still there.
De Beers is just fine.
Along with Alrosa they already constitute half of the global diamond supply, and that makes irrelevant the place where raw material is being processed.
Russia controls more than half of the global diamond reserves, and that is only official. For years, there are constant rumors that Russia hides some very valuable and huge deposits to keep that as leverage if needed.
Diamonds are not only jewelry, you know
I have no idea how the Chinese expansion in Africa influenced the supply, maybe Mir has some info for us as he is close in range as both South Africa and Botswana own big deposits either.
Aside from that, diamond production was always a dirty business, and the phrase "bloody diamonds" is there not by accident. That is mostly connected with sourcing diamonds in countries like Congo and other unstable African countries, but still, lots of people are involved in this amoral business. Considering that, any "embargo" on the country owning >50% of legal and civilized global supply and having established connections with the entire world's business, will be simply ineffective.
Yet they can try to fool themselves, why not

ArgentinaGuard wrote:The economic terrorism they do with Russia and the bear's ability to resist is incredible. They hate Russia and everything it stands for. They want to kill their population.
The Jewish banks in the West didn't even do it to Nazi Germany.

Is different. Sometimes I asked myself why so much hatred of the western leaders (I don't know if the populations of this country have the same feeling) against Russia. The most likely reason is the impossibility of subjugating the Russian people and plundering their resources. In fact, I think the biggest hate is the Americans, the rest just follow the boss's orders.

AZ
@AZmilitary1
The termination of gas supplies from Russia would lead to a 12.5% drop in German GDP and the loss of 5.6 million jobs across the country, the German Bild reported on Tuesday with reference to the study of the Unification of the Bavarian Economy.

........................

It is the equivalent of a weapon of mass destruction. But that would have bad side effects for Russia as well. Germany is an important player in the world. There would be an unprecedented economic crisis in Europe and Europe is still one of Russia's main energy buyers despite the sanctions. Commodity prices would drop a lot doing so, which is not interesting either.

Latest 3 major steps taken:

Target gold and diamonds (goal ...lower foreign exchange income)
Declare faux default (bankruptcy) with the intention of hurting crediting rating leading to problems with issuance of debt and foreign investment (goal).
Placed a Russian oil price cap. Give the Russians the choice to still sell its oil to Western markets but under West rules (which are intended to alleviate the blow-back of sanctions in Western economies - more or less making them bearable and sustainable, unlike now, neutralizing a Russian weapon more or less).

Obviously the major one is the oil price cap. It's really simple. Russia can either agree to the new terms and be confirmed a bitch while calling for a new world order and all the other propaganda BS looking for idiots to throw themselves in the fire or it can lead by example, stick to its guns and see this through and hurt their enemies where it clearly hurts. We shall see. Obviously, Gazprom oligarchs will agree to anything that makes them money, even if that means bending a thousand way backwards. Up to Putin and the political class to keep those internal whores in check. Again, we shall see.

G7 nations reach deal on Russian oil price cap – Politico
https://www.rt.com/business/557969-g7-russia-oil-price-cap/

The Group of Seven (G7) leading Western economies reached an agreement on Tuesday to set a price cap on Russian oil exports, Politico reported, citing unnamed officials.

The details of the agreement have not been revealed. However, according to the story, the US suggested lifting sanctions on insurance for ships that transport Russian oil only if countries agreed to buy it at a settled maximum price, thus enforcing a price cap.

The implications of this are enormous... not to mention a massive dick wave.

Free markets? only for the suckers.

ATLASCUB wrote:Obviously, Gazprom oligarchs will agree to anything that makes them money, even if that means bending a thousand way backwards.

You would be wrong. One example is after the seizure of Gazprom Germania all gas supply contracts from Gazprom to it were cancelled. After nationalization of Gazprom gas distributors in the UK, which for example supply natural gas to the British NHS, all Russian gas supply contracts to those units were also cancelled. And if you think the initiative to do this was merely started by the government you would be wrong. In my opinion the government is merely doing cover for what Gazprom leadership already wanted to do. Another example would be after Poland stopped accepting gas for rubles, the state stopped all gas flows through Yamal pipeline which goes through Poland. Despite Yamal pipeline being partly owned by Gazprom while pipelines through Ukraine are not even partly owned by Gazprom and indeed require payment of transit fees to Ukraine. A country Russia is at war with. I think this was because that pipeline was partly owned by the Polish gas operator which had previously de facto seized the Novatek distribution business in Poland. When the Polish government nationalized it and handed out running the business to the Polish gas operator.

ATLASCUB wrote:The details of the agreement have not been revealed. However, according to the story, the US suggested lifting sanctions on insurance for ships that transport Russian oil only if countries agreed to buy it at a settled maximum price, thus enforcing a price cap.

As usual the West can only think like bean counters and bankers. Insurance is a matter of setting up the appropriate structures and having the capital. In the modern world the Western banking sector is no longer alone in the world even if you add the Swiss and Singaporeans to your side. You have the Hong Kong and Shanghai bankers for example. And Russia also has its own in St. Petersburg and Moscow. Then you have the ones in Abu Dhabi. The idea that a new insurance service won't show up in this vacuum the West is creating is, I think, pretty hubristic on their part. And it will help kick their fintech business down a notch. The UK with these continuous sanctions has constantly been torpedoing the worth of its financial sector. Which at this time is the main source of revenue for them. Few people remember, but Lebanon at one point used to be a major banking heaven, and right now that is mostly a memory. The UK risks going into a similar place.

https://t.me/mapsukraine/836

Italians are collecting foods from dustbins while their leaders are busy pouring more weapons & money into Ukraine. Even the Ukrainians have comparatively a better life despite the ongoing war. This is the sorry state of one of the richest EU countries. It's sad to see that common people are suffering because of the policies of their stupid leaders. If this continues then the entire Europe would become a giant shithole just within few years. Imagine what would've happened if Russia retaliated in kind.

Russia is methodically replacing Western franchises

ATLASCUB wrote:Latest 3 major steps taken:

Target gold and diamonds (goal ...lower foreign exchange income)

exchange for 9% of population still GDP power but year by year going donw not up. Unless you believe in US propaganda not numbers.
90% can buy whatever they want. For rubles for exmaple.

Declare faux default (bankruptcy) with the intention of hurting crediting rating leading to problems with issuance of debt and foreign investment (goal).

investors are those who stole 330 billions USD Russia alone? I tell you in private it investor can earn money they will come this or another way. There are other countries then G7 too.

Placed a Russian oil price cap. Give the Russians the choice to still sell its oil to Western markets but under West rules (which are intended to alleviate the blow-back of sanctions in Western economies - more or less making them bearable and sustainable, unlike now, neutralizing a Russian weapon more or less).

its not cap for selling but cap for insurance of ships. Wasent  the micro-Napoleon demand to cap all commodities?      

This move means to me, that the  west is in dire shit.  This is more to help west then to shit Russia.
Unlike Russia west is dependent of commodities and food.  Let's wait who wins iphones or food and electric power. Tik tok.

Obviously the major one is the oil price cap. It's really simple. Russia can either agree to the new terms and be confirmed a bitch while calling for a new world order and all the other propaganda BS looking for idiots to throw themselves in the fire or it can lead by example, stick to its guns and see this through and hurt their enemies where it clearly hurts. We shall see. Obviously,

both dont exclude themselves really. part can be sold by novatek with cap but I donn think Gazprom/Rosneft will go this way. What counts now is to slowly but surely dismantling G-7 power by refusing to use their currencies. Especially for commodities. And food. You can live without iPhone or Facebook but you cannot live without food , shelter or electricity. Also build up financtial institutions. To hve banking or insurances in non usd/euro area. Thus helping other countries to have choice.


As for oil.  Ship insurance  is not problem not to overcome. If anyone needs tankers Russian state or state company can insure this. Or tankers can be enlisted to Russian navy. Do you suggest Soviet ships were insured in London in 30s?




You can believe that geopolitical chasnge is Russian propaganda.  That resource dependent 780milions of 8bbillions population can give orders to everyone. Especially when they cannot use bombs nor carrier groups. Neither against  China nor Russia.  Did politico write that G-7 is living way beyond their means?  


You can also believe that neither Chinese nor Indians have their own national  interests and they clearly dont know who is going to be next if Russia fails. World is changing right now. West is slowly but surely crumbling and rest of the worlds is going up.


What matters is reality.  Pozhyviom uvidim

Rosstat put some numbers out. Industrial numbers look very bad. Most likely, due to broken supply chains and sanctions.
This is one that needs to be tracked closely.
https://rosstat.gov.ru/compendium/document/50801
Some numbers ( all numbers May '21 vs May '22):
Cars: -96.7% (biggest drop - only 3700)
Trucks: -40%
ICE motors: about -60%
Passenger train wagons: -60%
Freight wagons:about -50%
Fiberglass cables: -80%
Appliances: roughly -60%
AC electric motors: -50%
Excavators: -60%
My personal take is that i didn't expect such huge drop in some categories. It will be very important to track these numbers and their trend to see how fast they are fixing supply chains and new markets.

I kind of expected it. Most of these categories are exact same thing basically. Motor vehicles. Lack of access to automotive electronics, and in some cases, like rail wagons, certain bearings which used to be imported from Europe. You can't get common rail injectors, or direct injection electronics for engines, and in some cases even certain engine parts were imported or whole engines. And you have the issue with bearings. The vehicle electronics will likely be imported from China instead, eventually the Russian industry will develop their own, most of these electronics are out of patent and can be easily duplicated, it is a matter of having a ready supply rather being something hard to design. I expect half of that production to recover until end of year as suppliers switch to China and India. Longer term, in 2-5 years, Russia will have its own internal supplies.

With regards to electric motors, China is a huge manufacturer, and they can make basically everything. They have everything including their own winding machine tools for mechanically winding electric motors. Many decades ago used to be made by hand in countries with cheap labor. Just buy their damned tools and make Russian engines out of Russian copper wire.

With regards to appliances, a lot of this is likely foreign manufacturers leaving, but Turkey and China are major makers of appliances so they will likely replace the ones which left.

A lot of those products haven't switched suppliers before due to institutional innertia. But a lot of them have already switched to Asian suppliers and more will do so as a short term solution until Russian industry makes its own products.

lancelot wrote:I kind of expected it. Most of these categories are exact same thing basically. Motor vehicles. Lack of access to automotive electronics, and in some cases, like rail wagons, certain bearings which used to be imported from Europe. You can't get common rail injectors, or direct injection electronics for engines, and in some cases even certain engine parts were imported or whole engines. And you have the issue with bearings. The vehicle electronics will likely be imported from China instead, eventually the Russian industry will develop their own, most of these electronics are out of patent and can be easily duplicated, it is a matter of having a ready supply rather being something hard to design. I expect half of that production to recover until end of year as suppliers switch to China and India. Longer term, in 2-5 years, Russia will have its own internal supplies.
With regards to electric motors, China is a huge manufacturer, and they can make basically everything. They have everything including their own winding machine tools for mechanically winding electric motors. Many decades ago used to be made by hand in countries with cheap labor. Just buy their damned tools and make Russian engines out of Russian copper wire.
With regards to appliances, a lot of this is likely foreign manufacturers leaving, but Turkey and China are major makers of appliances so they will likely replace the ones which left.
A lot of those products haven't switched suppliers before due to institutional innertia. But a lot of them have already switched to Asian suppliers and more will do so as a short term solution until Russian industry makes its own products.

All rail stuff was driven - literally - by the Ukrainian components.
Wagon trails for example used to be 90+% dependent on the Ukro deliveries.
This all means a huge switch in the supply chain, some new production etc. Donbas already started to apply rail wheels in numbers.

Russian fuel sales by country first 100 days of SMO.

https://twitter.com/AZmilitary1/status/1542304244086329345/photo/1

sepheronx wrote:

caveat emptor wrote:Rosstat put some numbers out. Industrial numbers look very bad. Most likely, due to broken supply chains and sanctions.
This is one that needs to be tracked closely.
https://rosstat.gov.ru/compendium/document/50801
Some numbers ( all numbers May '21 vs May '22):
Cars: -96.7% (biggest drop - only 3700)
Trucks: -40%
ICE motors: about -60%
Passenger train wagons: -60%
Freight wagons:about  -50%
Fiberglass cables: -80%
Appliances: roughly -60%
AC electric motors: -50%
Excavators: -60%
My personal take is that i didn't expect such huge drop in some categories. It will be very important to track these numbers and their trend to see how fast they are fixing supply chains and new markets.

Most of if not all of that is entirely domestic market.  Exports of those items were very slim to begin with.  As you said, major issue was supplies mix in where automotive were foreign brands leaving.

It's gonna be tough year in those fields. Appliances may get fixed first next to cars as they localize production and import from elsewhere. But that will take time as they will need to make new deals and transportation of the spare parts.

More than predictable since the entire supply chain was compromised with sanctions along with the departure of western players could only have this effect. The positive side is that you have the money to rebuild all this, locating the production cycle as much as possible in Russia.

https://www.rt.com/business/558063-russia-strong-ruble-intervention/

I think Russian Govt. shouldn't try to weaken the ruble. Let it get stronger on its own. The Central Bank of Rusia has already relaxed some of the capital control measures on the ruble so

Russian exports will hurt in that process but export based economy sucks anyway. Russia should develop an economic mechanism that don't rely on exporting to foreign countries. Russia is already gigantic & with the recent addons from Ukraine it will become a mini continent on its own. So they should be able to develop a robust self-sufficient economy free from the nuances of export economy.

Is different. Sometimes I asked myself why so much hatred of the western leaders (I don't know if the populations of this country have the same feeling) against Russia. The most likely reason is the impossibility of subjugating the Russian people and plundering their resources. In fact, I think the biggest hate is the Americans, the rest just follow the boss's orders.

They don't like rivals and Russia and China have completely different cultures that are viable for countries in the third world to follow instead of US culture which is what the western culture is based around.

Ironically they sanctions are making them more viable by removing US franchise food companies like McDonalds etc... most countries have street food, which is obviously hit and miss, but it is part of the culture that is destroyed by western culture who demand local governments set food standards to kill off competition...

For the west especially the liberal lefties who used to support socialism in the sense of supporting the more vulnerable members of society, now hate Russia for selling out to the west (ironically), while the conservatives see them as commies still despite the growth and development in Russia proving they just use common sense to fix their problems and help their own.

With regards to electric motors, China is a huge manufacturer, and they can make basically everything. They have everything including their own winding machine tools for mechanically winding electric motors. Many decades ago used to be made by hand in countries with cheap labor. Just buy their damned tools and make Russian engines out of Russian copper wire.

Actually working with strands of material woven into more complex items like carbon fibre and indeed many composite materials Russian production has literally exploded and they make quite a lot of the stuff.

Russia makes tools too... why import tools when you can spend a few years importing the products themselves from China and develop your own tools so eventually you are making your own electric motors.

Electric motors are huge and will be as important in the future as internal combustion engines are now... it does not make sense to leave it to China... in the future all electric drive ships and cars and bikes and busses and trains and trucks and aircraft and trams etc etc is the future... Russia should get involved... and working with strands of material to weave fabric hasn't be done by hand for a very long time...

A lot of those products haven't switched suppliers before due to institutional innertia. But a lot of them have already switched to Asian suppliers and more will do so as a short term solution until Russian industry makes its own products.

And that is an important factor too.... they were happy to buy stuff from the west... why not buy from the rest of the world instead... some things might be worth making yourself because in many cases the foreign made stuff might not be suited to the Russian climate, or the technology just might be valuable... batteries that retain charge at minus 50 degrees temperatures for electric vehicles would be a good example.

There are a lot of electrically related technologies where Russian tech knowhow would be a huge advantage and help move the industry forward with better products made cheaper or more efficiently, while retaining or improving performance.

More than predictable since the entire supply chain was compromised with sanctions along with the departure of western players could only have this effect. The positive side is that you have the money to rebuild all this, locating the production cycle as much as possible in Russia.

Would be interesting to see the same data for the UK and France and Germany and the US, because they are having supply chain problems at the moment too that are not even related to sanctions they have imposed on other countries.

I think Russian Govt. shouldn't try to weaken the ruble. Let it get stronger on its own. The Central Bank of Rusia has already relaxed some of the capital control measures on the ruble so

Russian exports will hurt in that process but export based economy sucks anyway. Russia should develop an economic mechanism that don't rely on exporting to foreign countries. Russia is already gigantic & with the recent addons from Ukraine it will become a mini continent on its own. So they should be able to develop a robust self-sufficient economy free from the nuances of export economy.

I can't say I agree... an export oriented economy is healthier than an import driven one... having a realtively weak currency means imports are more expensive and western goods cost more or they reduce their profits to sell in Russian markets... both of which are good for Russia.

Having a weak currency has led to them getting where they are now... why change that?

Having a strong ruble will not help them trade with the rest of the world.... the west has the most money because it keeps its printing press running 24/7 but with the sanctions the value of that money to Russia is near to zero because western sanctions means they can't spend it, so Russia needs to trade with the rest of the world and one of the barriers to trade with the west is using US dollars instead of their own currencies.

Current system of devalued currency works in some aspects that it makes it much cheaper to do production in Russia than elsewhere.

Exactly... a strong currency means it makes more sense to shift production to a foreign country so you lose all the development and production skills and wages go to foreign economies instead of your own.

Obviously Russia can't and shouldn't make everything they need and want because that is wasteful when potential trade partners could make things and use those to trade for other things Russia makes that they want.

owais.usmani wrote:

https://twitter.com/KawsachunNews/status/1542500573651533826

Poison dwarf Micron would get more sense talking to a cabbage patch doll.
And Micron is frankly an uber-mong himself.

It shows these "democracies" are a total sham when Micron is despised, and Biden should be in a nursing home. But people forget that "democracies" eg in Ancient Greece AND more recently actually had slavery as a fundamental of their system.

Who cares, its all just nonsense being imposed by the West, once the West falls or losses enough influence, slavery,  pedofilia, child labor, end of womens right, are all gonna make a big comeback.

Becuase in the end, there is no objective morallity, much less a universal morallity, its all just imposed nonsense.

AlfaT8 wrote:Who cares, its all just nonsense being imposed by the West, once the West falls or losses enough influence, slavery,  pedofilia, child labor, end of womens right, are all gonna make a big comeback.

Becuase in the end, there is no objective morallity, much less a universal morallity, its all just imposed nonsense.

not pedofilia but "taking care of Ukrainian refugee kids" according to the newest standards

France wants cap on oil prices worldwide — not just Russia

A strategy the US proposed to target Russian oil should apply to all oil producers worldwide


ELMAU, Germany — France has upended talks at the G7 leaders' summit over a proposal to cap the price of Russian oil by insisting instead on worldwide price controls that would apply to all producers, including the United States, according to two officials monitoring the talks.

The Élysée confirmed that French President Emmanuel Macron is pushing for a worldwide ban, setting the G7 up for a showdown with countries like Saudi Arabia in the OPEC producers' cartel.

Asked whether France proposed to fix a cap to the price of oil at a global level, an Elysée official said: “Yes, not only on Russian oil. It must take into account all market players.”

https://www.politico.eu/article/france-wants-worldwide-cap-on-oil-prices/

That is the best reason to prove that ze west keeps living way beyond its own means: We cannot pay the real price for your commodities so you have to decrease your prices. And we wont cut ours because this is a free market

But that's fucking great news tbh! That means that marine insurers will be created outside 9% of worlds overspending population the worlds community .


In short term though my bet would be to enlist some tankers to Russian navy. Any attack means war.

ArgentinaGuard wrote:The economic terrorism they do with Russia and the bear's ability to resist is incredible. They hate Russia and everything it stands for. They want to kill their population.
The Jewish Zionist banks in the West didn't even do it to Nazi Germany.

There, fixed it for you. Zionist banks financed the creation of the nazi war machine

Who cares, its all just nonsense being imposed by the West, once the West falls or losses enough influence, slavery, pedofilia, child labor, end of womens right, are all gonna make a big comeback.

Becuase in the end, there is no objective morallity, much less a universal morallity, its all just imposed nonsense.

That sounds a lot like the pro America fanboy defence when it is proven America are a bunch of self centred who couldn't care less about anyone but the 1% funding their campains and their comfortable retirements... yeah it is bad but it would be much worse if Russia or China were in charge... ignoring the fact that most countries who oppose the west don't allow those things or don't need to because womens rights are not really a problem in Russia like it was in the west.

More importantly there are plenty of US close allies where slavery and child labour and womens rights and child molesters are walking free or even own their own islands because once you have money the laws no longer apply to you in the west.

The pretense that the world would collapse without the west to lead it is absurd, much of the corruption in the world eminates from US printing presses... and not just the money, but the propaganda which has been transformed into digital communications channels spewing the same message.

Perhaps a response from Russia at any attempt to cap prices for Russian oil could be to ban all sales of Russian oil to the G7... and ironically that would work because no third party is going to buy oil and sell it to the G7 countries with a good profit margin built in because the G7 want to limit Russian income so they wont pay any price to get Russian or any other oil.

More importantly Russia can chat to its other oil producing buddies and make deals on everyone not selling oil to the G7... which will hit them rather harder tha it will hit anyone else.

It is very two faced of the G-7 to be talking about phasing out all use of oil based energy products and fossil fuel energy products by 2030 or 2050 or whenever while at the same time demanding they also sell it cheap while cutting off investment for finding new resources of those fossil fuels.

Without investment the known oil and gas reserves are going to stop growing and start to run out, and with the G7 demanding reduced prices just because, they will seriously damage an industry they have been using the last decade or so to damage Russia and Venezuela...

This is the oil an gas producing nations to recover some of that lost income when oil was 30 dollars a barrel and it cost them 50 dollars a barrel to get it to market.... but now the west wants to steal from them again... pretty sure they are likely to see things Russias way and not the G7s way.

But it is ironic they are looking to Iranian gas and Venezuelan gas to save europe... good for Iran and Venezuela but they should be very careful what they sign with those devious .

The blockade by Lithuania of Kaliningrad... I kinda get the feeling that Germany thinks Russia might cut gas off to the EU all together through the Ukraine so only Turkish pipes will be pumping gas, because the Germans are desperately trying to get through rules that state EU sanctions on Russian exports don't apply in cases of Russia to Russia transit through Lithuania... seems one EU country has realised poking the bear is not a sensible game to be playing as Ukraine is ripped to shreds... maybe the taste of blood has awoken suppressed angry feelings towards the rest of the in the EU....