Posted on 01/05/2015 10:32:50 AM PST by elhombrelibre
MOSCOW—The ruble weakened on its first trading day in 2015, as the price of oil, Russia’s main source of hard currency, dipped to the lowest level since 2009.
The battered currency, which lost more than 40% against the dollar in 2014, was down 6.1% around midsession on Monday, with one dollar buying 59.44 rubles. On the first trading day of 2014, the rate was 32.03 rubles per dollar.
Russia’s dollar-denominated RTS index was down 4.1%, while its ruble-denominated peer Mices was up 2.2%. In dollar terms, Russia’s stock market index has nearly halved since the start of 2014.
Although New Year and Christmas holidays are under way in Russia until next Monday, Jan. 12, the Moscow Stock Exchange is closed only Wednesday for Christmas day in the Orthodox church.
However, trade on both the stock exchange and foreign-exchange market is very thin as many banks and brokerages are closed for the whole week.
(Excerpt) Read more at wsj.com ...
"We want to see the fallout from the likely loss of S&P investment grade in the first quarter and some stability in oil, before turning more positive", said Bank of America/ Merill Lynch, adding that the European Union’s sanctions review in March may provide some respite to the market."
Congress is likely to pass the stiffest sanctions on Russia yet early in this session, which will put sanctions on it that rival those on Iran and North Korea. Obama will have no choice but to sign it. And the EU should be forced to go along with it and impose similar sanctions or face sanctions of their own.
Their bond rating will be junk soon, too, won’t it?
The world has gone to war with Putin and there will not be a shot fired or a bomb dropped and Putin will be defeated.
If he’s smarter than he’s been acting, that’d be the way it should end.
Rule One of Russian politics.
The stupider and more oppressive a leader is, the more popular he will be.
Yes, they’ve a great track record of accepting autocrats and commies as their leaders. The seem to do fine with suffering as long as they’ve got a belly full of vodka.
>The seem to do fine with suffering as long as they’ve got a belly full of vodka.
Looks like things are getting rather serious in Russia as Putin found it necessary to sign a law forbidding vodka price to rise.
http://www.news24.com/World/News/Putin-orders-vodka-price-cap-20141224
That ought to work out swell. Price controls never do. I would imagine they’ll get even drunker now and die a few years earlier. What’s life expectancy in Russian for men, 50?
Two things to follow:
- Russian foreign reserves. They burned $100 billion in 2014 and are down to $400 billion
- the Russian body count from Donbas. Kremlin doesn’t keep track how many of its citizens died there so it’s up to unofficial sources. Those have it in low thousands (3 or 4K, I think. But it’s anyone’s guess). The rate has slowed down since the fall started and is likely to pick up again in the spring.
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