The long -awaited negotiations of Russia and the USA in Geneva did not bring certain results. The markets will wait for the next meeting Russian-American negotiations in Geneva did not bring any specific result.

The year 2021 was a seismic year for Russia as the Kremlin launched an unprecedented crackdown on the political opposition to President Vladimir Putin, talk of war escalated and inflation spiraled. In our review of 2021, we look at four main topics: domestic politics, foreign policy, the economy, and the fate of Russia's coronavirus vaccine. 1.

Russia and the United States held talks in Geneva on security guarantees. The Russian delegation was led by Deputy Foreign Minister Sergei Ryabkov, and the American delegation by US Deputy Secretary of State Wendy Sherman. The meeting lasted about eight hours.

The unrest in Kazakhstan began with protests against increasing automobile gas prices. The gas crisis was a consequence of the non -market price regulation in this market - after a long -term freezing of prices for liquefied gas, the Kazakh government was forced to go for their liberalization under the threat of deficiency. But this was only an occasion - and the reasons should be sought in a significant deterioration in the welfare of the population of Kazakhstan in the past two years.

Bitcoin fell below $40,000 for the first time since September last year, writes Bloomberg. The cryptocurrency sank 6% to $39,774, extending its year-to-date drop to 14%. According to the publication, this is the worst start to the year for Bitcoin since at least 2012. Data from the CoinDesk website indicates that bitcoin fell around 17:30 Moscow time, but by 18:38 it partially won back the fall and cost $41,029.

Video game developer and publisher Take-Two will buy mobile games company Zynga, according to a joint press release. The transaction amount is $12.7 billion. Take-Two will pay $9.86 per share of Zynga, at a 64% premium to stock at the close of trading on January 7th. The deal will be paid for in cash and Take-Two shares. According to its results, Take-Two shareholders will receive 67.2 to 70.4%, and Zynga shareholders - from 29.6 to 32.8% in the combined company.

The situation in the markets in 2022 will differ from the one to which investors are accustomed to the last two years, the Western investment banks note: leading central banks are moving to the rate of raising bets, real rates, although they will remain at a historically low level, continue to grow, and the growth of economics and corporate profits will decrease. We tell you what to make an investor in this situation.

This week marks the start of the publishing season for companies' annual reports. This is yet another test for a market shaken by the prospect of faster Fed rate hikes, writes The Wall Street Journal (WSJ). The market tumbled last week on news that the Fed is likely to raise rates faster than investors were bidding. The S&P 500 index, which rose 27% last year, sank 1.9% in the first week of the new year, the worst start of the year in five years.

The omicron strain could cost the UK economy £35bn, or roughly $50bn, in just two months of 2022, The Sunday Times wrote , citing an analysis by the Center for Economic and Business Research (CEBR). This is about a fifth of the country's total losses from Brexit. The rapid spread of "omicron" threatens a new wave of isolation of people, which will lead to a shortage of staff, analysts at CEBR said.

President of Kazakhstan Kassym-Jomart Tokayev, at an extraordinary session with the participation of the leaders of the CSTO countries, said that the protests in the republic were an attempted coup. Preparations for it were carried out for a long time, and a wave of unrest began, "as if on a single command." Kassym-Jomart Tokayev President of Kazakhstan Under the guise of spontaneous protests, a wave of riots unfolded.

Russian media sharply reduced the negative attitude towards Ukraine ahead of the talks between Russia and the United States, writes Bloomberg. Negative Russian coverage of Ukraine has dropped sharply from a peak in early December - a sharp increase in negativity began in October, according to a study by the Prague-based data analysis company Semantic Visions. How the study was conducted The company studied the tone of publications on online resources with the Russian domain name “.ru”.

In a little over a week, the protests in Kazakhstan turned from economic to political, reaching pogroms, arson, and riots. They led to a change in the configuration of power, the introduction of the collective troops of the CSTO into the country and became a factor in world politics in the context of Russia's upcoming negotiations with the US, NATO and the EU.

Preliminary talks between Russian and US delegations on security issues were held in Geneva. Russia's spokesman, Deputy Foreign Minister Sergei Ryabkov, has already called the conversation "difficult" but said it was "amazing." The topic of the talks was security issues in Europe, which the countries raised after another aggravation of the situation around Ukraine.