Translated material
The cost of war in Ukraine. Online November 25
The Bell continues to conduct online, dedicated to the economic consequences of the war in Ukraine, which began on February 24.
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22:03 The EU has postponed negotiations on a price ceiling for Russian oil, reports Bloomberg . EU countries have not been able to agree on what should be the marginal price. The European Commission proposed to set it at $65-70 per barrel. Poland and the Baltic countries opposed, they consider such a ceiling too high.
Negotiations continued from Wednesday, but did not lead to anything. But they have exposed the main drawback of the idea of an oil ceiling, the agency notes: countries are forced to choose between limiting Russia's oil revenues and avoiding a sharp rise in prices. If the price is set too low, Russia will stop the supply, which will lead to an increase in oil prices. And too high a price will not harm Russia in any way.
21:35 In October, the Ministry of Justice reported that Kovin had been excluded from the register of foreign media agents. But now it is still listed in the registry. This is the first time a person has been recognized as a foreign agent again , notes . Avtozak LIVE
21:20 Vitaly Kovin, political scientist and chairman of the Golos movement (recognized as a foreign agent) in the Perm Territory, was today recognized as a foreign agent for the second time. At the end of September 2021, he entered the register of media-foreign agents , and now he has become an individual foreign agent.
21:15 The Ministry of Justice has replenished the registers of foreign agents. This time they are:
- Evgeny Roizman, former mayor of Yekaterinburg;
- Anna Mongait, TV presenter of the Dozhd TV channel (recognized as a foreign agent);
- Ilya Novikov, lawyer, player “What? Where? When?";
- Fyodor Telin, former lawyer for Alexei Navalny's designated extremist headquarters in Ufa;
- Vitaly Kovin, political scientist and chairman of the Golos movement (recognized as a foreign agent) in the Perm Territory;
- Alexandra Garmazhapova, a journalist who worked for Fontanka and Novaya Gazeta;
- Lyubov Barabashova, Sakhalin journalist;
- City Without Barriers LLC, a Kazan project focused on creating an accessible environment.
18:56 The Bell investigation about the creator of the Rybar telegram channel has been officially confirmed. A former employee of the press service of the Ministry of Defense, military translator Mikhail Zvinchuk admitted his authorship in an interview with RTVI.
16:53 Ukraine has connected to the network and will soon bring to full capacity all three nuclear power plants that were turned off on Wednesday during the Russian attack on the country's energy system. The fact that it took two days shows the growing extent of disruption to the power grid.
16:48 At the meeting between Vladimir Putin and the mothers of military personnel, seven employees of budgetary organizations and participants in pro-government movements were present, found out the Agency . The leaders of the Council of Mothers and Wives of the Mobilized, as well as the Committee of Soldiers' Mothers, said that they were not invited to a meeting with Putin, the resource stated.
14:06 Politico writes that "nine months after the start of the invasion of Ukraine, Vladimir Putin began to succeed in splitting the ranks of the West."
- We are talking about the dissatisfaction of European officials with the profit of the United States in the war, and in three aspects at once: expensive gas (in the European Union, LNG from the United States is four times more expensive than at home), expensive weapons (what supplies to Ukraine will have to be replaced with will cost more, and will benefit US military-industrial complex) and protectionism (Biden's $369 billion inflation plan).
- Moderate dissatisfaction in an interview with Politico was expressed even by EU diplomacy chief Josep Borrell: "The Americans, being our friends, make decisions that affect our economy." Anonymous officials are sharper: "If you look at things soberly, the United States earns the most from the war, because they sell more gas and more weapons at a high price."
- According to one of the diplomatic sources of the resource, US discontent is really growing in Europe, according to another, it can be extinguished and "unite public opinion", but only if the US gives a discount on gas. “When it seems that your loyal ally is only profiting from your troubles, it sends the wrong message,” the diplomat says.
11:58 Finance Minister Anton Siluanov called the exchange of assets frozen in the EU and Russia “theoretically possible”, but admitted that the scheme is complex and requires a lot of legislative work. Initiatives, according to him, "are under consideration, I would say that in the initial stage of consideration."
For the time being, Russians can try to unfreeze their assets themselves through a broker. How to do this, explained The Bell.
11:41 The German economy passed the third quarter even better than expected : a preliminary estimate of 0.3% quarterly growth was revised to 0.4% despite the energy crisis and the war in Ukraine. The economy is pulled by household consumption (+1%). The largest EU economy will not avoid a winter recession, but most likely it will be noticeably smaller than forecasts.
The main thing for the night and morning:
- Foreigners doing business with Russia are increasingly doing so via the dark web , where fees can reach 20-30% or even more. Transactions are not always associated with something illegal, but can be used to reduce the risk of currency blocking and secondary sanctions.
- UAC will lease to airlines not just used aircraft, but aircraft restored after storage. According to Vedomosti , by 2024, passenger Red Wings should receive eight Tu-204/214s, cargo Volga-Dnepr and Aviastar-Tu - one An-124 and two Il-96-400Ts. 15 billion rubles will be allocated for restoration.
- The Ministry of Finance, which in the summer proposed to tax the salaries of employees of Russian companies living abroad and working remotely, with personal income tax at a rate of 30%, softened its position a little. Minister Anton Siluanov believes that the “Russian” 13% tax rate is enough for them, given that the number of such workers has increased markedly.
- The German authorities intend to take 90% of the superprofits of alternative energy, which arose due to a sharp rise in the price of electricity from gas generation, and send them to the state package of energy subsidies for 54 billion euros. The cut-off rate for wind, solar and nuclear generation is proposed at EUR 130 per MWh until the end of June 2023.
- The IMF has published a theoretical paper on the impact of sanctions on economies. The main conclusion is that sanctions also affect the country that imposes them, but they affect the one that has become their object more strongly under almost any initial conditions. The main assumption is that the country-object must be a resource country.
- If China delays easing its Covid-0-tolerance policy, Oxford Economics will cut its 2023 GDP growth forecast by a full percentage point from 4.2% to 2-2.5% this year from 3.1%. That hard options have run out of steam was shown this week by workers' riots at Foxconn's main iPhone assembly plant in Zhengzhou.