Mike Norman Economics

MOSCOW, March 31. /TASS/. If gas buyers from unfriendly states refuse to pay for gas in rubles, Russia will view it as breach of contract, President Vladimir Putin said at the meeting on the situation in the aviation sector."If such [ruble] payments are not made, we will consider this to be the buyers’ failure to perform commitments with all ensuing implications," Putin said....TASS (Russian state media)Russia will view refusal of paying for gas in rubles as breach of contract —...

U.S.: India buying more crude from Russia could expose it to a "great risk" in light of more sanctions against Moscow.Kpler data: Indian purchases of Russian oil had jumped to an average daily of 360,000 barrels.Moscow and New Delhi finalized an alternative payments platformWhen national interest collides with geopolitics....OilpriceU.S. Warns India Against Buying More Russian OilIrina Slavhttps://oilprice.com/Energy/Crude-Oil/US-Warns-India-Against-Buying-More-Russian-Oil.htmlSee alsoTASS...

Some signs of demand slowdown in oil. Is fiscal slowing, too. And, there's no such thing as QE and QT.

The Vineyard of the SakerRussian SMO in the Ukraine – Day 34http://thesaker.is/russian-smo-in-the-ukraine-day-34/Sitrep: That ‘bumbling’ presidential aide Medinsky …. amarynthhttp://thesaker.is/sitrep-that-bumbling-presidential-aide-medinsky/Ramzan Kadyrov speaking about the negotiations with Ukraine(closed captions available)http://thesaker.is/ramzan-kadyrov-speaking-about-the-negotiations-with-ukraine/A Son of the New American RevolutionRussia Mythology Dominates the U.S. MediaLarry C....

MOSCOW, March 30. /TASS/. Russian President Vladimir Putin informed German Chancellor Olaf Scholz regarding the decision to switch to payments for Russian gas in rubles, the Kremlin press service reported. The two leaders had a phone conversation on Wednesday."Vladimir Putin informed the Federal Chancellor on the subject of switching to payments for gas supplies in Russian rubles, in particular, for Germany. The change in the payment procedure is being introduced due to the fact that, in...

Reaction: "Eat the rich."Zero Hedge"Put On Your Seatbelts": BlackRock CEO Warns Over 'Scarcity Inflation'Tyler Durdenhttps://www.zerohedge.com/markets/put-your-seatbelts-blackrock-ceo-warns-over-scarcity-inflation

Let's just say that the situation is fluid, as the post shows. Standing of principle sounds fine, but the foundation of principle is sand, not granite.Zero HedgeGermany Scrambles To Ration Gas After Refusing To Make Payments In RublesTyler Durdenhttps://www.zerohedge.com/energy/germany-scrambles-ration-gas-after-refusing-make-payments-rublesSee also at ZHEuropean leaders have grown quite fond of bandying about the notion of liberating their economies from their dependence on Russian oil and...

I have been slowly getting back into things, and been thinking about what to write next. Based on a conversation with Gabriel Mathy on Twitter, I just want to quickly discuss how term premia ought to be measured. I think I have mentioned this before, but I felt like running through the arguments briefly again. I then have a few other unrelated comments to fill out this article....Bond EconomicsMeasuring Term Premia (And Other Comments)Brian...

Given that the war in Ukraine is the focus of a massive propaganda operation in the West, it’s telling that it’s fading a bit from attention, either by design or a need to regroup. While the business press still gives the war top billing due to the fact that energy supplies and pricing around the globe are very much in play, the level of discussion on Twitter in the last couple of days has dropped dramatically. Similarly, I don’t check into Daily Mail religiously, but not all that long ago,...

All this suggests is that the shift in international currency strength after the Ukraine war will not into some West-East bloc, as most argue, but instead towards a fragmentation of currency reserves; to quote the IMF: “if dollar dominance comes to an end (a scenario, not a prediction), then the greenback could be felled not by the dollar’s main rivals but by a broad group of alternative currencies”. That may have even worse consequences for world peace and for the smooth expansion of the...