The ruble is going to hell (not anymore?)

[Kakmakr]

Well, what are the use of people withdrawing Fiat currency from the Banks, but the Fiat currency are losing value at a record rate? Soon the Russian Ruble will be worthless ..like the Zimbabwean Dollar and they will not be able to use it.   

Russia should have anticipated that the Ruble will suffer ...like Zimbabwe did when Robert Mugabe apposed the West. If these sanctions intensify... we will see a 1 Trillion Ruble banknote. I will convert my fiat (Ruble) to Bitcoin as soon as possible to try and protect it's value against hyperinflation. 

[1714205162]

1714205162

[wxa7115]

LOL.. this is a complete meltdown... before the oil prices crashed in 2014, the exchange rate was like 1 USD = 30 RUR. Now it is 1 USD = 105 RUR. I have sympathy for anyone who holds his savings in RUR. Pension funds, savings accounts.etc become worthless if being held in the Ruble. One positive that may come out of this is, it may become more difficult for the oligarchs to move their money to London or Paris, and this may force them to spend at least some of that money inside Russia. Putin is not going to be bothered as long as crude stays above $100 per barrel.

In a way I'm sorry for them as well, however we need to be honest we knew this was coming, we knew that at some point in time Russia was going to invade Ukraine so Russian citizens had years to prepare themselves for the situation that we are seeing.

So anyone that is losing a great deal of money is doing so because they did not have the foresight to exchange their local currency for something else that will retain its value in a better way, however while this is without a doubt going to affect the population I'm not so sure the government is going to be that affected by the exchange rate, as it is known that a weak currency is good when you want to export a lot of goods out of your country.

[Emitdama]

Propably end of Russian Central bank and wakeup call for every individuals who hold their assets in the form of Fiat. How can government says what to do with our earned money? They didn't gave it for free we all worked our ass to get some and multiply with our smart work for years then suddenly an individual order what we should hold?

They can do what they wanted to because it was from them and people are only borrowing it even if they say that it was on their own hands. This is the downside of using a government/bank owned currency because it can be frozen anytime. There is no one to be blamed here but us if we still continue using fiats.

We have already been warned before about the risks and we are being recommended to use bitcoin. When we work we should prefer to get paid in bitcoin, btc is also ideal for future savings than storing money in the banks because you don't know what can happen with your money. Its value are also going to decrease over time.

[Sithara007]

Man, I hope pension funds and retirement accounts are sticking to the stock and bond markets instead of dabbling in foreign currency (especially Russia's).  But I bet there's a lot of currency traders who are making a killing on this--and also a lot who are losing their shirts.

All this is good news for currency traders. But for the ordinary investors and pensioners within Russia, it is disastrous. Many of them would have lost a large part of their life savings. Whatever savings they have now is worth only around 30% of what it was in 2014. And given the fact that Russia imports a large part of its food products and electronics, the inflation rate is also going to go up. The only saving grace is that the government will be getting more rubles for every barrel of crude oil exported by the oil companies.

[Obito]

I'm not in support of this war as I care only for peace, this war will only make crypto get to a better place faster because now Ukraine and Russia people will understand the real purpose of crypto and BTC no wonder the market is recovering fast today.

Russia would be the one that's going to benefit the most in this scenario though although it's going to be a problem for them though as there's only so much bitcoin that they can get out of it. Of course no one is supporting this war, pretty sure that the only ones that support this slaughter is the higher ups in Russia.

[Smitty Werben Man Jensen]

I'm not in support of this war as I care only for peace, this war will only make crypto get to a better place faster because now Ukraine and Russia people will understand the real purpose of crypto and BTC no wonder the market is recovering fast today.

Russia would be the one that's going to benefit the most in this scenario though although it's going to be a problem for them though as there's only so much bitcoin that they can get out of it. Of course no one is supporting this war, pretty sure that the only ones that support this slaughter is the higher ups in Russia.

If we look at it actually almost all countries in the world condemn what Russia has done to Ukraine,
I don't know how this war will end but I hope all of this can be over soon,
I think humanity and peace are above all else so we'll see what happens in the future

[Poker Player]

All this is good news for currency traders. But for the ordinary investors and pensioners within Russia, it is disastrous. Many of them would have lost a large part of their life savings. Whatever savings they have now is worth only around 30% of what it was in 2014. And given the fact that Russia imports a large part of its food products and electronics, the inflation rate is also going to go up. The only saving grace is that the government will be getting more rubles for every barrel of crude oil exported by the oil companies.

I think things like this are what are going to drive bitcoin up in the long run. People are going to learn the hard way that state currencies are ruinous and that the best way to keep your savings is Bitcoin. The only thing that is missing for people to adopt it more massively is a decrease in volatility, which is what many people are afraid of.

[Mauser]

It seems that Putin's gamble is not working out as he had hoped. He is moving militarily rather slower than he anticipated and now apart he has taken two economic measures:

To stop the bleeding of the ruble, which is plummeting even in the face of a weak USD due to over-printing, he has also ordered that: "Russian businesses that trade abroad must sell 80% of their foreign currency earnings and convert them to rubles...

So far it hasn't even been a week of conflict and things are already so out of control. Inflation is rising while the Ruble is dropping sharply. It is crazy to believe that Putin factored in all these Western sanctions and negative economic effects on the Russian economy when he planned the war with Ukraine.  It is very hard to get any independent news from the frontlines, there are a lot of Ukrainian videos that showing abandoned or destroyed Russian equipment, while the Russian TV shows they take Ukrainian soldiers that are captivity and large columns of tanks and equipment heading for Kiev. The question I ask myself is how long can Ukraine withstand that Russian pressure? Putin must have factor a time period for Russia to withstand that economic cost of war, it might be 4 weeks, or 8 weeks, or even longer. But eventually Russia needs to find a way to reconcile things with the world and try to get access to western markets again. It also remains to be seen how far is China willing to go to support Russia.

[Sithara007]

All this is good news for currency traders. But for the ordinary investors and pensioners within Russia, it is disastrous. Many of them would have lost a large part of their life savings. Whatever savings they have now is worth only around 30% of what it was in 2014. And given the fact that Russia imports a large part of its food products and electronics, the inflation rate is also going to go up. The only saving grace is that the government will be getting more rubles for every barrel of crude oil exported by the oil companies.

I think things like this are what are going to drive bitcoin up in the long run. People are going to learn the hard way that state currencies are ruinous and that the best way to keep your savings is Bitcoin. The only thing that is missing for people to adopt it more massively is a decrease in volatility, which is what many people are afraid of.

In countries like Russia, Zimbabwe and Venezuela, people may line up to convert their national currency to Bitcoin, and this may weaken the national currency further. And I don't expect the government to stand still and allow this to happen. They will take more and more authoritarian stance against the cryptocurrency users, else the national currencies will get destroyed. So it needs to be seen whether the users in these countries will be able to purchase cryptocurrencies such as Bitcoin and Ethereum.

[teosanru]

It seems that Putin's gamble is not working out as he had hoped. He is moving militarily rather slower than he anticipated and now apart he has taken two economic measures:

"President Vladimir Putin banned all Russian residents from transferring hard currency abroad, including for servicing foreign loan contracts, potentially putting much of the country’s $478 billion in external debt at risk of default."

Source: Putin’s Ban on Foreign Debt Service Raises $478 Billion Question.

To stop the bleeding of the ruble, which is plummeting even in the face of a weak USD due to over-printing, he has also ordered that: "Russian businesses that trade abroad must sell 80% of their foreign currency earnings and convert them to rubles...

A picture is worth a thousand words:



This is starting to cause panic among its population, which has rushed en masse to withdraw cash from ATMs:

Russians rush to withdraw cash at ATMs as rouble plunges; central bank hikes rates to 20%

The most important thing in the conflict is the human drama with dead, wounded and displaced people, but I wanted to open thread to comment in this economy section what could be the medium term future of the Russian currency and economy.

I wonder if some of these measures affect Best_Change, which I understand is a business located in Russia, but I don't know if they will want to comment anything.

Very nice example to prove how fiat's value is derived by nothing but how strong are other fiat's holding it. If all of them have targeted your economy you alone won't be able to handle your fiat and it will burst. Same which is going to happen to Russia if things don't stop soon. There is just one way Russia can handle this war it's using the printing machine but which also they would be able to do only until the economy goes into hyperinflation.

Talking about Best Change, I didn't know it was based out of Russia, but I think it's most of the operations don't involve Ruble, they do crypto to crypto exchanges and in fiat primarily dollar exchanging.

[Fortify]

It seems that Putin's gamble is not working out as he had hoped. He is moving militarily rather slower than he anticipated and now apart he has taken two economic measures:

"President Vladimir Putin banned all Russian residents from transferring hard currency abroad, including for servicing foreign loan contracts, potentially putting much of the country’s $478 billion in external debt at risk of default."

Source: Putin’s Ban on Foreign Debt Service Raises $478 Billion Question.

It is amazing how hard and how fast the world has come together in condemning this invasion. He was most likely expecting a whimpering response like he saw in the 2014 Crimea annexation but this time is an extremely harsh backlash. There was zero justification for this war and it's finally exposed his incompetence. Unfortunately he is just a little old man now, so many other people dying is of little consequence to his future. Ukrainians and Russians, he's happy for them all to get slaughtered for his pathetic attempt at a legacy, he did nothing else for Russia in the last 20 years. I'm just waiting to see the devastation that will be reaped on the Russian stock market when they reopen after 3 days of forced closure.

[adaseb]

It looks like it has stabilized a little. Currently sitting at 100 per USD for many exchanges. I think the efforts that they took such as making interest 20%, injecting money into the economy and preventing selling of foreign currencies is helping. At least temporarily.

The stock market and everything in the USA seems stable too. The only thing that is ripping higher is the price of crude oil which hit $120 an hour ago or so.

This is pretty bad since we were around $80-90 a few months ago. And with inflation where it is this is going to hurt many people. Especially when it’s Time to buy gas.

[wxa7115]

All this is good news for currency traders. But for the ordinary investors and pensioners within Russia, it is disastrous. Many of them would have lost a large part of their life savings. Whatever savings they have now is worth only around 30% of what it was in 2014. And given the fact that Russia imports a large part of its food products and electronics, the inflation rate is also going to go up. The only saving grace is that the government will be getting more rubles for every barrel of crude oil exported by the oil companies.

I think things like this are what are going to drive bitcoin up in the long run. People are going to learn the hard way that state currencies are ruinous and that the best way to keep your savings is Bitcoin. The only thing that is missing for people to adopt it more massively is a decrease in volatility, which is what many people are afraid of.

In countries like Russia, Zimbabwe and Venezuela, people may line up to convert their national currency to Bitcoin, and this may weaken the national currency further. And I don't expect the government to stand still and allow this to happen. They will take more and more authoritarian stance against the cryptocurrency users, else the national currencies will get destroyed. So it needs to be seen whether the users in these countries will be able to purchase cryptocurrencies such as Bitcoin and Ethereum.

There is a very strong possibility that at some point something like this is going to happen, but at the same time when people are confronted with the choice of obeying a nonsensical law and keep doing what they are doing which brings food to the table they will pick the latter all the time.

So even if weak governments begin to incarcerate cryptocurrency users in the near future that is not going to be enough deterrent against them, and not only that, such a thing will lower even further the popularity of the government creating even more resistance against such laws.

[coolcoinz]

It looks like it has stabilized a little. Currently sitting at 100 per USD for many exchanges. I think the efforts that they took such as making interest 20%, injecting money into the economy and preventing selling of foreign currencies is helping. At least temporarily.

The stock market and everything in the USA seems stable too. The only thing that is ripping higher is the price of crude oil which hit $120 an hour ago or so.

This is pretty bad since we were around $80-90 a few months ago. And with inflation where it is this is going to hurt many people. Especially when it’s Time to buy gas.

Guess what, 140 USD per RUB! The weakest ruble ever, and it's going to get worse since Putin wants to cut the Internet. If that happens they'll be like North Korea. I said that in one of my previous posts a couple days ago, Russia is going to become isolated and abandoned and there was time to act and there were options to stop it, but instead of looking for a peaceful resolution Putin demanded that Ukraine simply gives up and stops resisting. I hope he goes to where the ruble is going.

[stompix]

It looks like it has stabilized a little. Currently sitting at 100 per USD for many exchanges.

Dead bear bounce!

I think the efforts that they took such as making interest 20%, injecting money into the economy and preventing selling of foreign currencies is helping. At least temporarily.

Yeah, trying to live in a glass bubble, shutting down the stock market, not allowing the population to convert to USD and euro, forcing companies to sell foreign currency to prop it, it the end the free market will always win, there will be a parallel exchange rate and then really it's going to go to hell.
I've told poeple numerous times, that's not how reserves work, that's not how sanctions work,  the 600 billion are nearly useless, it doesn't matter how big the country is, what matters is that it was poor as hell before, and now it will get even poorer.

And what poeple still fail to understand is that it doesn't matter that oil and gas go through the roof, if nobody buys it, Ural mix is trading at 90$, a full 25$ discount compared to Brent because poeple are not buying. And gas prices went up because Russia was not pumping, so how much you make if gas is at 1 trillion per cubic cm but you sell zero? Cause the moment they would sell the price would go down and everything they are pumping now is old contracts at far lower prices.

But now, Russia is stronk, Russia is big, Russia is ...in deep shit! And the only thing they have left and have an oversupply of is their pride, pride which will be their final nail in the coffin since it prevents them from making the decisions they should.

Putin must have factor a time period for Russia to withstand that economic cost of war, it might be 4 weeks, or 8 weeks, or even longer.

Putin never thought of that.
All Russians and even westerners thought Ukraine will fall in 3 days so basically by the time they would be able to react it would be all over as in Crimea.
If the Russians would have captured Kyiv and put another leader there basically what were we going to do, nothing, accept it and that's it, but people are fighting back and the west knows that Russia will never be able to control it, so sanctions now are hitting hard and the more the conflict goes and civilians are falling victims the deeper the hole Putin is digging himself and the country in.

[Sithara007]

Putin is not going to care as long as oil prices go up. Brent crude touched $139 per barrel yesterday and that will bring around $1 billion per day to the Russian treasury from oil exports alone (anything above $27 per barrel is taxed at close to 100% rate in Russia, and they export around 8 million barrels of crude every day). Natural gas prices are at record highs and that will also add to the revenues. And since Ruble is going down, the government needs to spend less money on salaries and pensions.

Biden made things easy for Putin, by sabotaging the Keystone XL pipeline and banning fracking on federal lands.

[Argoo]

I'm not in support of this war as I care only for peace, this war will only make crypto get to a better place faster because now Ukraine and Russia people will understand the real purpose of crypto and BTC no wonder the market is recovering fast today.

Russia would be the one that's going to benefit the most in this scenario though although it's going to be a problem for them though as there's only so much bitcoin that they can get out of it. Of course no one is supporting this war, pretty sure that the only ones that support this slaughter is the higher ups in Russia.

I don’t know what benefit Russia will get from the current military attack on Ukraine, but the international sanctions that have already been introduced and are being prepared will eventually set its economy back many decades. Russia is fast becoming a pariah and will most likely be another North Korea. Just thinking about how Russia will defend itself against sanctions is one thing. But Russian soldiers are now continuing to launch missile and bomb attacks on civilian cities in Ukraine, causing great damage to its economy and killing civilians.
Already now, the International Criminal Court in The Hague has begun to consider the application of Ukraine against Russia on the genocide of the Ukrainian people. The guilt of the Putin regime in this is obvious, and as a result, Ukraine will have to compensate for the damage caused.
Foreign exchange reserves in Russia were about 640 billion dollars and about 70 percent were in the accounts of banks in other states and have already been frozen. In all likelihood, they will go to Ukraine as compensation for damage. Other property belonging to the state of the Russian Federation and its citizens will also be confiscated. Russia will eventually be a secondary and impoverished country. Aggression will have to be paid for, and this is logical and natural.

[Nivia1st]

Putin is not going to care as long as oil prices go up. Brent crude touched $139 per barrel yesterday and that will bring around $1 billion per day to the Russian treasury from oil exports alone (anything above $27 per barrel is taxed at close to 100% rate in Russia, and they export around 8 million barrels of crude every day). Natural gas prices are at record highs and that will also add to the revenues. And since Ruble is going down, the government needs to spend less money on salaries and pensions.

Biden made things easy for Putin, by sabotaging the Keystone XL pipeline and banning fracking on federal lands.

but still the fall of the ruble will have an impact on the Russian economy. maybe they can get by with the oil this time. but for the long term and the many sanctions, will make this big country not good. so the only option was to withdraw their invasion as soon as possible, that way they could avoid worse trouble.

[arwin100]

Putin is not going to care as long as oil prices go up. Brent crude touched $139 per barrel yesterday and that will bring around $1 billion per day to the Russian treasury from oil exports alone (anything above $27 per barrel is taxed at close to 100% rate in Russia, and they export around 8 million barrels of crude every day). Natural gas prices are at record highs and that will also add to the revenues. And since Ruble is going down, the government needs to spend less money on salaries and pensions.

Biden made things easy for Putin, by sabotaging the Keystone XL pipeline and banning fracking on federal lands.

but still the fall of the ruble will have an impact on the Russian economy. maybe they can get by with the oil this time. but for the long term and the many sanctions, will make this big country not good. so the only option was to withdraw their invasion as soon as possible, that way they could avoid worse trouble.

Oil price is skyrocketing which I think in that area they will bounce back and Russia knows that already that's why their government is no worried about those temporary sanctions happening to them. But feel pity to those people who go affected especially those other citizens or overseas workers who work on Russia because their income will be totally affected on current economic situation on Russia especially for those people who save Ruble in their bank accounts.

[fiulpro]

After Putin lost 11,000 troops, he needed to stop. The Russian Ruble is now worth nothing and Putin earned one million as a bounty.

This is not funny since now he is loosing and is cornered, he has used so many missiles more than 600 already that his military power is crumbling.

He won't be able to keep this up for long, the only weapon he has left is the Nuclear that is why the world is extra cautious about him.

The guy is going down and wants to take everyone down with him. Russian economy is done for and their gas business is dying, their country is not self sufficient at all and they know this.