Russian stock market plunges

[other one]

It may be that the people of Crimea and the eastern provinces would actually rather be part of Russia...   if that is the case the east and west parts may never be able to come together and it might be in the best interest of everyone if Putin does annex them......   but it should be their choice.  Whatever the case it's none of our business outside the workings of the UN.,

[other one]

 

I note as to how it is reported that Putin put his plans to their legislature & got approval.  But what leads you to think that Putin got instruction from his govt?  I thought he was the instructor!

 

Well my mind said "approval" but my fingers typed "instruction"......   don't ask me why....   I'm too complicated to know.

[Steve_S]

As many American and Europeans economists have been saying, the Russian economy is fragile at best and the Ukrainian crisis is causing chaos in the markets there.  Putin is, effectively, wiping out Russia's recovery from the 2009 global recession.

 

http://news.yahoo.com/russia-hikes-rates-amid-market-carnage-over-ukraine-100455087.html

 

A daily dive in a stock market and currency is not something one can hang their hat on insofar as there being far reaching implications for the russian people. As Nigel notes later in this thread, russia is a huge energy supplier. They export more oil than any other country and a ton of europe's natural gas comes from them. Russians tend to stick together when they feel like outsiders are messing with them, that's been their way for centuries, and that's one reason they are past difficult to conquer. If the global community thinks it can harm putin by sanctions, putin may stop exporting gas and oil completely, then you're going to see western markets start going haywire and energy costs spiking due to it. Every day i keep seeing people say "now putin has really messed up, this is really it this time, surely he won't get away with this."

 

This has been going on since georgia and has just been increasing in frequency as time passes. In my opinion it's time for us to face some facts (please note, these are only my opinions).

 

Firstly, russia is not going away and keeping your fingers crossed hoping their economy collapses is wishful thinking. They built a military that could go toe to toe with the united states and kept it going for decades amidst near constant economic turmoil under oppressive soviet communism. It took that long for them to finally collapse under their own weight. Quite frankly, their economy is far more stable, right now, than it ever was when they were the soviet union. Their oil and gas isn't going anywhere, they can wait out sanctions, or they can completely pull it from the market and watch gas prices in the US go to 5 or 6 dollars a gallon and watch brownouts in places like germany in europe because they have no natural gas.

 

Secondly, this is going to further encourage them to meddle in affairs that the US government actually does care about. The more we poke them in their atmosphere, the more they are going to poke us in ours. Why do we invite this? 

 

Thirdly, we have nothing to gain from opposing them in ukraine anyway. We aren't huge trading partners with ukraine. We have no defense treaties with them. I suspect most americans couldn't find it on a map.

 

Fourthly, it makes us look like hypocrites, for two reasons. One, we conquered and occupied two countries in the last 10 years. Two, we speak about recognizing democratically elected officials and how important that is, using that as a barometer for governmental legitimacy, and then, just because he is pro russian, oppose a democratically elected president while backing the forces that removed him with what equates to a popular ethnic coup (the ukranian speaking half or ukraine are pretty much the ones that did this), this AFTER we helped negotiate an agreement that would keep him in power until december and which was broken the very next day, with our full support.

 

I honestly believe there is no reason whatsoever to be involved in this mess. Us expressing support for ukraine's current government simply emboldens them to further action that russia will not tolerate. As neb points out in this thread, there are russian soldiers in ukraine right now and several more divisions on the border. Any move by the west to govern the east will almost certainly be met with the russian military, not some eastern ukranian militia. The best situation, right now, in which the fewest innocent people die, is the country splitting, in my opinion.

[Steve_S]

I believe this article illustrates some of the things I was pointing out in my previous post, specifically Europe's lack of willingness to commit to tough sanctions:

 

"But at an emergency meeting in Brussels the foreign ministers of Germany, France, Italy and Spain resisted calls for trade sanctions, instead limiting discussion to freezing long-running talks with Russia on visa liberalisation that would have made it easier for Russians to visit Europe. Washington is also threatening to kick Russia out of the G8 group of leading economies, but Berlin opposes that."

 

Great Britain evidently had a document leak that speaks to this sort of thing as well:

 

"Britain's attempts to ensure any EU action against Russia over Ukraine would exempt the City of London were embarrassingly revealed when a secret government document detailing the plan was photographed in Downing Street. The document said Britain should "not support, for now, trade sanctions … or close London's financial centre to Russians".

 

I believe that this is indicative of the sort of attitude that will prevent "tougher" sanctions (though, I don't think those would matter either). Basically it's "yes, let's sanction the russians! (as long as it doesn't affect us in any way)."

[ncn]

 

As many American and Europeans economists have been saying, the Russian economy is fragile at best and the Ukrainian crisis is causing chaos in the markets there.  Putin is, effectively, wiping out Russia's recovery from the 2009 global recession.

 

http://news.yahoo.com/russia-hikes-rates-amid-market-carnage-over-ukraine-100455087.html

 

A daily dive in a stock market and currency is not something one can hang their hat on insofar as there being far reaching implications for the russian people. As Nigel notes later in this thread, russia is a huge energy supplier. They export more oil than any other country and a ton of europe's natural gas comes from them. Russians tend to stick together when they feel like outsiders are messing with them, that's been their way for centuries, and that's one reason they are past difficult to conquer. If the global community thinks it can harm putin by sanctions, putin may stop exporting gas and oil completely, then you're going to see western markets start going haywire and energy costs spiking due to it. Every day i keep seeing people say "now putin has really messed up, this is really it this time, surely he won't get away with this."

 

This has been going on since georgia and has just been increasing in frequency as time passes. In my opinion it's time for us to face some facts (please note, these are only my opinions).

 

Firstly, russia is not going away and keeping your fingers crossed hoping their economy collapses is wishful thinking. They built a military that could go toe to toe with the united states and kept it going for decades amidst near constant economic turmoil under oppressive soviet communism. It took that long for them to finally collapse under their own weight. Quite frankly, their economy is far more stable, right now, than it ever was when they were the soviet union. Their oil and gas isn't going anywhere, they can wait out sanctions, or they can completely pull it from the market and watch gas prices in the US go to 5 or 6 dollars a gallon and watch brownouts in places like germany in europe because they have no natural gas.

 

Secondly, this is going to further encourage them to meddle in affairs that the US government actually does care about. The more we poke them in their atmosphere, the more they are going to poke us in ours. Why do we invite this? 

 

Thirdly, we have nothing to gain from opposing them in ukraine anyway. We aren't huge trading partners with ukraine. We have no defense treaties with them. I suspect most americans couldn't find it on a map.

 

Fourthly, it makes us look like hypocrites, for two reasons. One, we conquered and occupied two countries in the last 10 years. Two, we speak about recognizing democratically elected officials and how important that is, using that as a barometer for governmental legitimacy, and then, just because he is pro russian, oppose a democratically elected president while backing the forces that removed him with what equates to a popular ethnic coup (the ukranian speaking half or ukraine are pretty much the ones that did this), this AFTER we helped negotiate an agreement that would keep him in power until december and which was broken the very next day, with our full support.

 

I honestly believe there is no reason whatsoever to be involved in this mess. Us expressing support for ukraine's current government simply emboldens them to further action that russia will not tolerate. As neb points out in this thread, there are russian soldiers in ukraine right now and several more divisions on the border. Any move by the west to govern the east will almost certainly be met with the russian military, not some eastern ukranian militia. The best situation, right now, in which the fewest innocent people die, is the country splitting, in my opinion.

 

 

 

Good post brother. 

[MorningGlory]

A civil war when a foreign nation has its troops in there forcing an outcome?

 

Yes because the people in the Crimean region mostly want Russia there and the rest of Ukraine (mostly) does not.  My guess would be that there will be fighting between ethnic groups in that country.....I won't venture a guess as to whether the Russian troops that are there will get in the middle of it though.  Civil wars are never a good bet for a third country, regardless of their intentions.

[MorningGlory]

 

As many American and Europeans economists have been saying, the Russian economy is fragile at best and the Ukrainian crisis is causing chaos in the markets there.  Putin is, effectively, wiping out Russia's recovery from the 2009 global recession.

 

http://news.yahoo.com/russia-hikes-rates-amid-market-carnage-over-ukraine-100455087.html

 

A daily dive in a stock market and currency is not something one can hang their hat on insofar as there being far reaching implications for the russian people. As Nigel notes later in this thread, russia is a huge energy supplier. They export more oil than any other country and a ton of europe's natural gas comes from them. Russians tend to stick together when they feel like outsiders are messing with them, that's been their way for centuries, and that's one reason they are past difficult to conquer. If the global community thinks it can harm putin by sanctions, putin may stop exporting gas and oil completely, then you're going to see western markets start going haywire and energy costs spiking due to it. Every day i keep seeing people say "now putin has really messed up, this is really it this time, surely he won't get away with this."

 

This has been going on since georgia and has just been increasing in frequency as time passes. In my opinion it's time for us to face some facts (please note, these are only my opinions).

 

Firstly, russia is not going away and keeping your fingers crossed hoping their economy collapses is wishful thinking. They built a military that could go toe to toe with the united states and kept it going for decades amidst near constant economic turmoil under oppressive soviet communism. It took that long for them to finally collapse under their own weight. Quite frankly, their economy is far more stable, right now, than it ever was when they were the soviet union. Their oil and gas isn't going anywhere, they can wait out sanctions, or they can completely pull it from the market and watch gas prices in the US go to 5 or 6 dollars a gallon and watch brownouts in places like germany in europe because they have no natural gas.

 

Secondly, this is going to further encourage them to meddle in affairs that the US government actually does care about. The more we poke them in their atmosphere, the more they are going to poke us in ours. Why do we invite this? 

 

Thirdly, we have nothing to gain from opposing them in ukraine anyway. We aren't huge trading partners with ukraine. We have no defense treaties with them. I suspect most americans couldn't find it on a map.

 

Fourthly, it makes us look like hypocrites, for two reasons. One, we conquered and occupied two countries in the last 10 years. Two, we speak about recognizing democratically elected officials and how important that is, using that as a barometer for governmental legitimacy, and then, just because he is pro russian, oppose a democratically elected president while backing the forces that removed him with what equates to a popular ethnic coup (the ukranian speaking half or ukraine are pretty much the ones that did this), this AFTER we helped negotiate an agreement that would keep him in power until december and which was broken the very next day, with our full support.

 

I honestly believe there is no reason whatsoever to be involved in this mess. Us expressing support for ukraine's current government simply emboldens them to further action that russia will not tolerate. As neb points out in this thread, there are russian soldiers in ukraine right now and several more divisions on the border. Any move by the west to govern the east will almost certainly be met with the russian military, not some eastern ukranian militia. The best situation, right now, in which the fewest innocent people die, is the country splitting, in my opinion.

 

 

 

 

I agree with the 'hands off' policy but I believe you overestimate the strength of their economy. A one day tick in their markets resulted in the ruble being devalued.. Any country that bases it's economy on energy is building on shiftng sand.