Translated material
The cost of war in Ukraine. Online November 29
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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The war completely changed our lives. We have been writing about its consequences for each of us online since February 24. We have never taken money from readers for content, believing that we can earn money ourselves. But now our business model, like so much else in the economy, has collapsed. Help The Bell keep going!
This online is complete. Read the previous one here .
21:48 The Prosecutor General's Office has prepared an instruction on the suspension of the activities of the media for "fakes", including about the army or calls for unauthorized actions. The document is posted on the portal of draft regulatory legal acts. The grounds for the suspension of the work of the media may be publications, which, according to the authorities, contain:
- unreliable socially significant information that creates a “threat of harm” to citizens, property, disruption of public order or the operation of important facilities;
- false information about the use of the RF Armed Forces “in order to protect the interests of the Russian Federation and its citizens”, as well as the activities of Russian government agencies abroad for the same purpose;
- false information “about circumstances that pose a threat to the life and security of citizens”, and measures to ensure security and territories;
- information expressed in an indecent form, “which offends human dignity and public morality, obvious disrespect for society, the state, official state symbols” of Russia and its state bodies;
- calls “to organize and (or) participate in unauthorized public events”, to impose sanctions against Russia, its citizens or legal entities, to mass violations of public order, as well as “propaganda, substantiation and (or) justification of extremist activities”.
20:00 The first ship with Russian fertilizers left the Netherlands for Africa, said the representative of the UN Secretary General Stephane Dujarric. The cargo - 20,000 tons of fertilizer - will be delivered to Mozambique, from where it will be sent to Malawi. In total, 260,000 tons of fertilizer blocked in European ports amid sanctions are expected to be transferred to several African countries in the coming months. Moscow is providing fertilizer free of charge under agreements that Russia and Ukraine signed separately with the UN on July 22 in Istanbul.
18:44 In Ukraine, all large thermal and hydroelectric power plants have been damaged due to the massive missile strikes that Russia has inflicted on the Ukrainian energy infrastructure since early October, said the head of Ukrenergo Volodymyr Kudrytsky. “I cannot go into details about the consequences of each specific strike. But I want to emphasize that the essence of the unified energy system is that the consumer receives electricity not only from the nearest power plant, ” Kudritsky said in an interview with the Ukrainian edition of Novoye Vremya. Business". According to him, the purpose of Russian strikes is to make it impossible to deliver electricity from one region of Ukraine to another.
The margin of safety of the Ukrainian energy system is close to exhaustion - the last shelling on November 23 led to a long blackout in the largest cities and put the country on the brink of a humanitarian catastrophe. What to expect next, we told in a recent final newsletter .
17:25 The United States refused to take Russia's priorities and signals into account when preparing a meeting of the bilateral commission on START-3, in connection with which the meeting was canceled, said Russian Deputy Foreign Minister Sergei Ryabkov. He noted, in particular, that Washington only wanted to discuss the issue of resuming inspections, while other issues were a priority for Moscow. “Against the background of a deep disconnection, not only of priority, but of values, between Moscow and Washington, we did not see the slightest desire on the American side to move further in this direction,” explained Ryabkov . Russia will propose new dates for the meeting of the commission on START-3 after some pause.
15:48 The Ministry of Finance clarified the budget indicators: in January-September it was executed with a surplus of not 54.7 billion, but 200 billion rubles (0.2% of GDP). Until the end of the year, the budget will still become a deficit - 1 trillion rubles from the National Welfare Fund have been allocated for its balancing. Next year, the Ministry of Finance also expects to fully cover the budget deficit with funds from the National Welfare Fund, which is estimated at 2.9 trillion rubles (2% of GDP). The deficit is planned for the next three years (until 2025 inclusive).
14:47 The Russian billionaire Suleiman Kerimov, who is under sanctions, and his family will again become a defendant in an investigation in France, writes Bloomberg. A new group of prosecutors must find out the origin and ultimate beneficiary of the companies of Karimov's daughter Gulnara, who, in turn, own four villas on the Cote d'Azur. Kerimova paid 268 million euros for the asset, most of the funds were provided by her brother Said, the agency writes, citing materials from the anti-money laundering organization Tracfin.
These are the same villas that were involved in a long-standing laundering case that ended in a court settlement, and now they are not frozen, unlike most of the European assets of the “Russian oligarchs”. Kerimov's lawyer told Bloomberg that the change of ownership was transparent and well known to French regulators.
14:28 The amount of energy crisis assistance to businesses and the population in Europe in November exceeded 700 billion euros, writes Bloomberg. In general, this is almost the equivalent of all coronavirus Eurobond programs. More than a third of the costs (264 billion euros) came from Germany, which also has the largest share of aid in GDP (7.4%). The UK spent almost 100 billion euros, Italy 90 billion euros, France nearly 70 billion euros.
13:02 The Italian authorities are preparing to nationalize the Lukoil ISAB refinery in Sicily, the government will make a final decision this week, writes the Italian La Reppublica. This is a very large enterprise, providing 20% of Italy's oil refining, which depends on the supply of Russian oil by sea. Nationalization will provide alternative supplies.
The American Crossbridge Energy Partners wanted to buy the plant, but Lukoil doubted its solvency.
11:55 for the supply of LNG to Germany has been signed The first long-term contract , partially replacing long-term contracts with Gazprom. Qatar's state-owned company Qatar Energy will supply ConocoPhillips with up to 2 million tons of LNG per year from 2026 for 15 years. Similar contracts with other major buyers, including RWE and Uniper, are not ruled out.
The federal government will invest 6.5 billion euros over the next 10-15 years in the construction of five regasification terminals. They will provide a third of Germany's current gas needs.
9:20 am The Federation Council received a proposal from the President on the release of Alexei Kudrin from the post of Chairman of the Accounts Chamber. About the conditions under which Kudrin will head the "Russian" "Yandex" after the partition, we wrote here . According to the Agency, Kudrin is already in Istanbul, where he unofficially takes part in the board of directors of Yandex.
The main thing for the night and morning:
- Elon Musk has entered into a war with Apple, allegedly going to remove the Twitter he bought from the app store. In a series of posts , the billionaire attacked the 30% developer fee and accused the corporation of stifling free speech.
- Russian Urals oil shipped from Primorsk last Friday cost less than $52 per barrel, Bloomberg writes citing Argus calculations. These quotes will have a direct impact on the course of discussions on the price ceiling for Russian oil: the lower the spot price, the stronger the positions of countries seeking to lower the ceiling.
- Imports of non-sanctioned Russian LNG to Europe rose by 40% in January-October, to 17.8 billion cubic meters, or 16% of total LNG purchases. This is almost four times less than pipeline gas supplies from Russia, but gives it one more lever of energy influence on the EU.
- The Ministry of Internal Affairs of Russia was unable to purchase 2.8 thousand cars for the traffic police: due to sanctions, the usual traffic police Skoda Octavia and Hyundai Solaris and even Lada Vesta in the right quantity and trim levels are no longer on the market, and Chinese cars are too expensive. Lada Granta remained the only "available" option.
- Vedomosti wrote about another sanctions problem of the Ministry of Internal Affairs: in the future, problems with the issuance of passports are not ruled out due to the inability of government agencies to purchase imported dot matrix printers. All major companies (Epson, Lexmark) left the country, there is no production in Russia, but the available printers should be enough for the next year.
- Chinese stocks rebounded on Tuesday after falling on protests against the zero-tolerance policy for covid. The Hong Kong Hang Seng rose by 3.5%, the Shanghai Composite - by almost 2%: many investors believe that the authorities will go for an accelerated removal of restrictions.
- The Ministry of Finance has developed amendments to the Tax Code on the taxation of business in the "new territories". They are similar to the template for Crimea: temporary incentives for small businesses, tax residency by default (so as not to fall under the 30% tax) and a reduced tax base for land plots to a cadastral valuation.
- Cryptolending platform BlockFi, which has already stopped the withdrawal of funds, has filed for bankruptcy . This is another echo of the collapse of FTX - the second largest creditor of BlockFi turned out to be the US FTX operator West Realm Shires, who saved it this summer.