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Russia and China are developing a new reserve currency with other BRICS countries, President Vladimir Putin said. The basket currency would rival a US-dominated IMF alternative and let Russia widen its influence. The dollar's dominance is already eroding as central banks diversify into the Chinese yuan and smaller currencies. "The matter of creating the international reserve currency based on the basket of currencies of our countries is under review," Putin told the BRICS Business Forum on Wednesday, according to a TASS report. "We are ready to openly work with all fair partners." While it's not a reserve currency, the SDR...

Austria, Germany, Italy and the Netherlands announced plans this week to prepare to resurrect old coal plants as gas supplies dwindled. The moves came just days after Moscow reduced natural gas flows to several European countries, including Italy and Slovakia, alarming leaders who are worried about energy reserves ahead of winter. That’s not the direction in which these government wanted to move. A return to coal would controvert climate policy already in place in Amsterdam and Berlin. Some officials are concerned about the longer-term threat such a move would post to efforts to fight climate change in Europe. “We have...

JUST IN - Russian natural gas flows to France via pipeline from Germany have ceased.— Disclose.tv (@disclosetv) June 17, 2022MORE - Russia’s Gazprom will reduce gas supply to Italy by 50 percent today, says the energy company Eni.— Disclose.tv (@disclosetv) June 17, 2022

A German state agency has said that it will likely soon be providing over 400,000 more Ukrainian migrants with unemployment benefits over the next few weeks. A total of around 410,000 migrants ostensibly from Ukraine will soon be on the German dole, with hundreds of thousands more on top of that expected to end up receiving unemployment benefit in the central European state before the end of the year. This is the assessment of Germany’s Federal Employment Agency, which is already reportedly giving handouts to millions of migrants under the so-called “Hartz IV” scheme. According to a report by Die...

In a related development on Wednesday, the Greek government seized an Iranian ship operating under the flag of the Islamic Republic of Iran off the coast of that country and confiscated its cargo by alleged court order and in coordination with the US government.

Energy bills are set to go up by more than £800 this autumn - as the regulator warned that the price cap is likely to hit £2,800 in October. Ofgem's boss described soaring gas prices as a "once in a generation event" - made even more acute by Russia's war in Ukraine. Campaigners say - millions more people will be thrust into what is known as “fuel stress” - forced to choose between paying for food or heating their homes. ...

RIO DE JANEIRO (Reuters) - U.S. government officials in March asked Brazil's state-run oil company Petrobras whether it could increase crude output after Russia's invasion of Ukraine sent global prices soaring, three people with knowledge of the matter told Reuters. They came away empty-handed, the sources said. Officials at Petrobras, formally Petroleo Brasileiro SA, said output levels were a function of business strategy rather than diplomacy and also that a significant short-term production boost would not be logistically possible, the sources said. "We are ... doing everything possible with our allies and partners to mitigate the economic impacts of Russian...

... According to the former publisher of The Wall Street Journal, Karen Elliott House, Burns went to Saudi Arabia for a “mating dance” with Prince Mohammed – namely, the prince must cooperate on a new oil-for-security strategy to “increase production to save European nations from energy shortages.” Burns’ visit to the kingdom took place just ahead of the fifth round of Saudi-Iranian normalization talks in Baghdad between the Saudi intelligence chief and the deputy head of Iran’s Supreme National Security Council. Iraqi Prime Minister Mustafa al-Kadhimi, who was acting as mediator and attended the latest round of talks, told state...

Inflation rose to its highest level in over four decades in Germany, as the economic fallout from years of lockdown restrictions and the Russian invasion of Ukraine continue to bite the leading economic power of the European Union. Germany’s statistics agency Destatis announced on Thursday that consumer prices rose by 7.4 per cent in the month of April compared to the same time last year. The inflation rate is the highest level since 1981 in West Germany, when the country was divided by the Berlin Wall. The government agency said that fuel costs, which have been steadily rising since last...

Ukraine accused Russia of blackmailing Europe over energy in an attempt to break its allies, as fighting heads into a third month without Russia capturing a major city WARSAW/SOFIA/KYIV — Russia halted gas supplies to Poland under the Yamal contract on Wednesday, data from the European Union network of gas transmission operators showed, in a deepening of the rift between the West and Russia over its invasion of Ukraine. Bulgaria, like Poland a NATO and EU member, said earlier that Russia would also halt supplies of gas to it. Ukraine accused Russia of blackmailing Europe over energy in an attempt...

Russia decided to make "unfriendly nations" pay for its gas in rubles after the Western countries and their allies imposed harsh sanctions on Moscow over its military operation in Ukraine.Gazprom, major Russian gas company, is to suspend supplies to Bulgaria starting from April 27, the Agence France-Presse (AFP) reported on Tuesday, citing a statement from the Bulgarian economy ministry. The ministry announced that the country’s state-owned company Bulgargaz and the Bulgarian Energy Holding (BEH) assessed the possibility of implementing the new two-stage payment procedure proposed by the Russian government and said it “does not comply with the contract valid until...

In revealing testimony before the Duma parliament, the head of CBR told she had to throw everything but the kitchen sink just to prevent a full-blown run on the banking system. “The sanctions imposed against Russia affected the situation in the financial sector, spurred the demand for foreign currencies, and caused fire sales of financial assets, a cash outflow from banks, and surging demand for goods,” said Elvira Nabiullina ... Presenting the CBR’s annual report to parliament, Nabiullina painted a picture to lawmakers of just how grim the situation was that confronted her. Depositors withdrew 2.4 trillion rubles in the...

Utility asks state regulators for permission to harvest more revenue from customersIn what could represent a fresh jolt for customers, PG&E is seeking state approval to capture more revenue from ratepayers to help bankroll costs for an array of facilities and operations, according to a new regulatory filing. The utility is seeking revenue increases — which typically are extracted from ratepayers — for its estimated capital costs, the filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission states. “In the next five years, the company projects to fund essential infrastructure investments between $40 billion and $53 billion to modernize our system with...

If record-high food prices weren’t enough. The Russia-Ukraine conflict has choked off the world of sunflower oil supply, forcing the largest supermarket in the UK to begin rationing. The Guardian reports that Tesco, with more than 4,000 retail stores, placed buying limits of three cooking oil bottles per customer. It follows Waitrose and Morrisons, other supermarket chains that set limits of just two per customer. The UK’s biggest retailer is experiencing sourcing issues with cooking oil, especially sunflower oil, which much of it comes from Ukraine. As retailers panic about sourcing edible oils, it has driven retail cooking oil prices...

Ukraine is one of the world's top exporters of corn, sunflower oil, and wheat. Disruptions stemming from Russia's invasion of Ukraine have stoked fears the war-torn country could experience a 50% decline in crop output this year, according to Bloomberg.PixabayForecast data from ag expert UkrAgroConsult show Ukraine's corn output could be as low as 19 million tons, about half of last year's 41 million tons. UkrAgroConsult's pessimistic outlook follows huge production uncertainties as farmers experience shortages of diesel and fertilizer and bombed-out infrastructure. The outlooks of two other ag firms aren't as gloomy. Black Sea research firm SovEcon expects Ukraine's...

The Group of Seven major economies have agreed to reject Moscow’s demand to pay for Russian natural gas exports in rubles, the German energy minister said Monday. Robert Habeck told reporters that “all G-7 ministers agreed completely that this (would be) a one-sided and clear breach of the existing contracts.”

All the great globalist plans, and those of so-called "mavens" in America who have thought for years that putting labor and material supply overseas as a means to avoid paying market wages in the US, along with evading environmental laws by putting the pollution somewhere else, are now up against the law of unintended consequences.Russia has announced that it will soon require payment for its natural gas (and, presumably, all other exports) in Rubles. This is of course quite reasonable, since the resource depleted is theirs, and thus payment should be in their currency.I smelled this coming when the sanctions...

On Wednesday’s broadcast of the Fox News Channel’s “Special Report,” Sen. Kirsten Gillibrand (D-NY) argued that Russia is not participating in the Iran nuclear deal negotiations “in a legitimate or honest way” and is trying to get around sanctions and ensure a market for their oil. She warned that “we have to be very careful in not negotiating against ourselves,” and that “any negotiations with regard to an Iran deal will be quite difficult to accomplish in the near term.”

Russia plans to resume some stock trading on Thursday after a near month-long hiatus, with 33 rouble securities to be traded on the Moscow Exchange. Non-residents will have to wait, though - they will be barred from selling stocks and OFZ rouble bonds until April 1. Trading in blue chips, including state lenders Sberbank and VTB, energy majors Rosneft and Gazprom, will take place between 0650 and 1100 GMT, with short-selling banned, the central bank said on Wednesday. Russian stocks last traded on the Moscow Exchange on Feb. 25.

Putin: unfriendly states will pay Russia in rubles for natural gas. Putin ordered the Russian Central Bank to develop a system for payments in rubles within a week. The list of “hostile” states includes the United States, all EU member states, Switzerland, Canada, Norway, South Korea, Japan, and many others...