Galt's Gulch

Is the ruble really collapsing?

Posted by $ blarman 9 years, 4 months ago to News
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Can someone provide independent proof of this? I have a hard time believing Bloomberg, but I can't find anything prima facie wrong with this...
SOURCE URL: http://www.businessweek.com/articles/2014-12-16/no-caviar-is-not-getting-cheaper-everything-you-need-to-know-about-the-russian-ruble-collapse?campaign_id=DN121614

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  • Posted by Herb7734 9 years, 4 months ago
    All I've got is hearsay proof. I have an internet respondent who is convinced that it's real. He says they've been walking a tightrope for years and all it would take is a light breeze to topple them over.If that is true, it might make Putin more dangerous than ever.
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  • Posted by edweaver 9 years, 4 months ago
    I heard the same thing today but they may have been talking about the same article on the radio. It would not surprise me if it were true.
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  • Posted by richrobinson 9 years, 4 months ago
    I have a customer who is in the oil business. I told him I thought this was being done to slow down the Marcellus Shale business. He said this was being done by the U.S. and the Saudis as part of the sanctions against Russia. How far is this administration willing to go?
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  • Posted by term2 9 years, 4 months ago
    I am very excited to see what happens in a developed country (NOT OURS) when a fiat currency actually reaches its end game. The Ruble, like the dollar, is worth only the paper on which its printed at this point. It could actually go to near zero, wiping out all savings and investments and collapsing the economy. Putin is between a rock and a hard place. There will be a NEW ruble issued so that people can start over. But such a massive loss of wealth that the people thought they had is pretty much unprecedented. This is not like Venezuela, where the same thing is going to happen soon. We should all become students of exactly how this happened in Russia, and how it could happen here with our fiat currency. The time to protect ourselves is now, not when the lines form in the streets
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  • Posted by DrZarkov99 9 years, 4 months ago
    Putin isn't going to let a collapse happen, a la the Weimar Republic, and his czarist view of recovering the empire of Peter the Great isn't going to allow him to back off militarily. Better a wartime economy than hyperinflation and collapse.

    Expect him to continue to throw the dice with foreign incursions, betting on a soft American response. While he could challenge NATO by moving on the Baltic countries, he might instead decide to take a bite of Finland.

    As for the caviar, I expect to see an increase in paddlefish poaching here in OK. Paddlefish eggs make an extremely good substitute, but the catch is regulated.
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    • Posted by term2 9 years, 4 months ago
      Since socialist countries can only exist with help from outside through theft or use of natural resources, one could expect Putin to attempt to take over more countries. His problem is that he needs to take over "wealthy" countries, not the likes of Ukraine (bankrupt). He also needs the money to mount these military campaigns. With the citizens of Russia scrambling to find food, military campaigns are pretty risky for Putin.
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  • Posted by ObjectiveAnalyst 9 years, 4 months ago
    Will Putin take the route of the Romans? In order to sustain their crumbing empire once their money was devalued they conquered and plundered their neighbors. Putin does not seem like the type to change, negotiate or go down without a fight.
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  • Posted by mccannon01 9 years, 4 months ago
    OK, I may not be popular here in my opinion, but I still believe throwing Putin under the bus is a bad move for the U.S. because there is far more at stake here than meets the eye. Islam is on the move in the world and retaking Crimea, which they lost under Stalin, is very important. Russia has been at war with Islam for centuries and continues to this day no matter what government is ruling Russia at the time. Putin has to walk a fine line to contain this problem without having it break out into a massive jihad against Russia. OPEC's manipulation of the price of oil was a strike against both Russia and us. We are backing the wrong side on this one. Islam has to kill Russia and we are helping. Putin is not our enemy on this issue, but will become one if he has to to keep Russia alive.
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    • Posted by $ blarman 9 years, 4 months ago
      While I understand what you're saying, what you're doing is advocating that this is a "lesser of two evils" argument. It's Afghanistan from the 1980's all over again, except in reverse this time.

      I don't know. What does Putin have? Extensive natural resources and a pretty extensive advanced military - including nukes. Does he have the raw manpower or ideological zealotry of the Islamic hordes? No. That being said, Russia as a first-world nation is also much more dependent on a global economy than the nations supporting Islam, which are with few exceptions second-world nations.

      I'm not sure picking sides in this one does us any good. Islam's fight with Russia is incidental and territorial. Islam's fight with the US is ideological. Our differences with Russia are mostly policy (and the result of a pansy in the White House). Its hard to know where to go.
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      • Posted by mccannon01 9 years, 4 months ago
        Yes, it's hard to know where to go with this one. We don't want to pull another Neville Chamberlain, but I don't see where Putin is another Hitler or a Stalin. Russia is transitioning from a nasty totalitarian existence to a nation more worthy of living with and in and it's too early to tell if it has settled into a "lesser evil". It can fall backwards at any time and certainly shouldn't be pushed backwards. IMHO Putin will do the "right thing" if he isn't slapped around or boxed in. The "pansy in the White House" will side with Islam and that is dangerous for us and Russia. Putin will never let a new caliphate plant its flag in Moscow. The press is falling all over itself to make Putin look bad and the "pansy" look good. Bad move, IMHO.
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        • Posted by $ blarman 9 years, 4 months ago
          Putin actually has a nastier background than Stalin did, as Putin was head of the KGB for a while and oversaw countless violations of human rights. I think the difference is that Putin isn't as idealistic as either Stalin or Hitler - he's just power-hungry.

          I do agree that Putin will never allow the Islamists to run Russia unless it is over his dead body, and unlike our current President, I'd bet Putin actually is competent with a firearm.
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          • Posted by mccannon01 9 years, 4 months ago
            No doubt Putin has a closet full of skeletons, but I would say Stalin's mountain of bodies casts a very dark shadow that even covers Putins closet. In the end there is no point of us arguing this. Despots are despots and have to be dealt with in various ways depending on the individual. The U.S. cut a deal with Stalin to bring down Hitler. I still don't believe Putin is a Stalin. I'm reminded of a phrase from LBJ: "I'd rather have him in the tent pissing out than out of the tent pissing in."
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  • Posted by peterchunt 9 years, 4 months ago
    This couldn’t happen to a worst country (well with the exception of North Korea). My hope is that there is hyperinflation, a run on the banks, and a collapse of the Russian economy. Of course I would settle for any one of these.
    The downside is that this will make Putin more dangerous, and with the wimp in the Whitehouse, he might get away with it again.
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  • Posted by $ jbrenner 9 years, 4 months ago
    The value of the ruble is tied intimately to the price of oil, which has plummeted in the last month.
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    • Posted by RonC 9 years, 4 months ago
      This is why they call it "strategic" when referring to our reserves stored in caves for a rainy day. I have seen reports that the Russians and Chinese had a hand in the banking collapse, 2008. There are many ways to fight a war. Russia's most liquid asset is oil. When the world price dips below the break even point of production, every barrel produced is a net loss. OPEC, in retaining market share, is driving out the frackers, the Russians, the windfarms, the solar plants, all of that "new energy". Then, after the world is once more addicted to petrol, they will let prices drift up. For now, we enjoy a few more bucks in our pockets.
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      • Posted by Technocracy 9 years, 4 months ago
        The only fly in the ointment for OPEC being that the fracking industry know how is still around along with the infrastructure. So production will simply resume once it is profitable again, assuming the enviro-loons haven't managed to outlaw it by that time.
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    • Posted by term2 9 years, 4 months ago
      The value of the ruble is zero. Its a paper fiat currency backed by nothing but some misguided trust the people have that it IS a store of value and not just a short term trading token. Once that trust is broken, it just falls to essentially zero
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    • Posted by term2 9 years, 4 months ago
      The value of the ruble is zero. Its a paper fiat currency backed by nothing but some misguided trust the people have that it IS a store of value and not just a short term trading token. Once that trust is broken, it just falls to essentially zero
      Reply | Mark as read | Parent | Best of... | Permalink  

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