The Duran -- Russian economy strengthens. EU economies in tatters

The Duran ^ | September 21, 2022 | The Duran

[Cathi]

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6v1_39yAQkI

The Duran

Russian economy strengthens. EU economies in tatters

Alex: All right, Alexander, let's take a look at the Russian economy. We haven't done an update in regards to the Russian economy for a while now. And my question to you is has it collapsed yet? Has the Russian economy collapsed as we have been hearing? Ursula von der leyen in her State of the Union address, the EU State of the Union address thing that they do. She said, and she actually said this, that the Russians are removing chips from their dishwashers and using them in military stuff and elsewhere so she says Russians are removing chips from their dishwashers because she said the Russian industry is in tatters to a loud applause. Everyone was ecstatic that it's "mission accomplished." So is the Russian economy in tatters? Are Russians now having to resort to removing the micro chips from dishwasher? And if they are doing that...to use those micro chips in fighter jets that's a pretty incredible engineering, I must say.

Alexander: Well I'm not a technical person but I'm sure you're right actually. This is a nonsensical thing. Now we have had two reports from different people about the state of the Russian economy. One has appeared in CNN and it's sourced by all sorts of people from within the U.S. government and it accepted that the Russian economy has proved very resilient; that it's stood up to sanctions very well. They are disappointed by the way it has held together. They said that the expectation was that the disconnection from SWIFT and the seizure of bank assets would cause the economy to crater and they are both surprised and disappointed that that hasn't happened. So that's what CNN reports people within the administration are saying. So they don't appear to think the Russian economy has collapsed.

Perhaps an even more interesting or perhaps more authoritative view of the state of the Russian economy has come from the Russian Central Bank which has just cut interest rates again and they are now at 7 1/2 per cent. They were 20%, remember, at the start of March. They've now been steadily reduced so interest rates in Russia have been falling even as in the West they have been rising. Now the Central Bank said the economy is performing better than it expected...the Russian economy is performing better than the Central Bank expected. The business activity is recovering faster than the Central Bank expected. They also said that Russian businesses have succeeded in finding replacements for Western imports faster also than the Central Bank expected.

Now, the Central Bank says there is going to be a GDP contraction of 4%. The Russian Economics Ministry said that it is going to be only 2%. These are not big contractions. Everybody in Russia acknowledges that prices are actually falling. I'm not talking about inflation falling; I am talking about prices falling. Prices of physical goods in the shops have been going down. Now that's from a high increase in March, but they have been gradually settling backwards. The Central Bank things that process is now reaching it's end point and prices now are going to basically settle. But, it also expects that inflation, headline inflation figures are now going to start falling significantly in the Spring.

Now, none of that would be possible...none of that would be happening if the kind of scenario Ursula von der leyen was telling us were true. Now why are people like Ursula von der leyen saying that is because the European economy is actually falling apart. The British economy is falling apart. They have to keep the European public on board with this sanctions war...with this attrition war they're waging against Russia. And the same is true, by the way, in the U.S. so we have to these weird and wonderful stories about the Russians prizing micro chips out of washing machines to keep their Sukhoi fighter jets operating. It's outlandish, it's ludicrous. I'm not an expert on chips, by the way, Russia imports most of it's chips from China and Malaysia. Apparently those imports have been unaffected and I understand if you are talking about the kind of chips the military tends to use they are not the highest end chips anyway and as I have discussed in other programs the Russians almost certainly produce many more chips and more advanced chips than they have been admitting to and this has probably been going on for some time even though it is not something that the Russians like to talk about very much.

[Boogieman]

Lol, I guess we can say that you have conceded defeat in 2022 since you are busy trying to get people to refight battles from 2016.

[kiryandil]

Soros puppet on FR calls a REAL Trump supporter a "commie".

I'll bet I really got under your wrongwrong skin back in 2016 - just like I'm getting under your wrongwrong skin at this moment.     

[Boogieman]

‘calls a REAL Trump supporter a “commie”’

Except Trump denounced Putin’s invasion, and doesn’t support it and spout Kremlin propaganda every day like you do, commie.

[Jeff Vader]

he’s like cher these days, so big he only needs 1 name

[kiryandil]

July 7th, 2016:

https://freerepublic.com/focus/news/3447209/posts?page=110#110

LOLOL!!

[montag813]

[Seruzawa]

Er yes. Punish all those people born after 1945. Good move.

[Poison Pill]

An "article" on economics with this kind of hard data:

Well I'm not a technical person but I'm sure....

WOW. How insightful