Why would Russia want rubles? Suspect this is a scheme that purchasers of Russian oil and gas must “purchase” rubles from Russian banks at some fixed ridiculous rate in order to receive the oil and gas. In the near term the Europeans will either allow themselves to be gouged or freeze and allow their economies to grind down.
Also all this nonsense make smuggling of Russian oil, gas and fertilizer extremely lucrative. Suspect Putin has some old KGB buddies who are well experienced and adept at smuggling. No doubt Putin is getting his cut.
the same reason every country wants it’s own National Currency, if you are Russian and don’t want to hold Ruples, what good is the currency for anything, I don’t in Moscow they will start taking USD or Euros for Russians to use on a daily basis.
The truth is that Ruble is trading on Forex maybe about 2% below the pre-Ukraine thing right now, whereas in Moscow it is artificially lower, because the Russian centbank hiked rate and don’t want to look stupid.
I expect Ruble to appreciate to Dollar even without this move.
Reasons, are that Russia enjoyed a hefty positive trade balance before the crisis, and now it greatly skyrocketed. That’s due to the growing commodity prices and higher demand on weapons in combination with the exodus of foreign businesses for Russia. They get significantly more money right now, and most of them stay in Russia to be spent on Russian products.
““The West will need to use gold/silver to buy rubles. By controlling the amount of rubles the West can get its hands on, he can control the demand - which controls the price/value of rubles.
If the ruble is too low - he stops printing, rubles become harder to acquire, the West needs to spend more gold to buy them - this increases the value of the ruble relative to gold.
if the ruble is too high - he prints more making it easier for the West to buy them in gold, and that drops the value of the ruble relative to gold.
This is actually a genius move - and gives the Russian government absolute control over the value of their currency. The Chinese can only dream of controlling their currency that way.”
Not this, the customers cannot simply buy rubles. They must instead obtain rubles by selling to Russia something Russia wants. Not easy, and goes against their own sanctions.
Alternatively, they may be able to buy or borrow some amount of rubles from an intermediary (think China)... may alleviate their immediate problems. Not a long-term solution.
Alternatively, they can go into permanent depression. ----
I'm actually shocked -- Putin waited so long for this obvious move!
Why would Russia want rubles? Suspect this is a scheme that purchasers of Russian oil and gas must “purchase” rubles from Russian banks at some fixed ridiculous rate in order to receive the oil and gas.
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Increase in demand increases the price of things.
If people buy more rubles than before, their value increases. Even if it isn’t at a fixed rate, but they buy more at a free market rate, their value increases.