Your Weekend Reading: Russia Faces the Financial Consequences
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A policeman outside a residential building hit by Russian artillery strikes on Kyiv, Ukraine, on Feb. 25. Ukraine’s president said Kremlin forces were continuing attacks on military and civilian targets on the second day of their invasion.
Photographer: Erin Trieb/BloombergWestern leaders rolled out financial penalties against Russia for its invasion of Ukraine, with sanctions targeting major banks, companies and the assets of Russian oligarchs. U.S. President Joe Biden also announced new export curbs. But western allies spared Vladimir Putin’s oil exports and didn’t block Russian access to SWIFT, the global bank messaging system. European countries remain concerned about their supply of natural gas, much of which comes from Russia. “The West is financing Putin’s war” by buying Russian natural resources, Javier Blas writes in Bloomberg Opinion. As the West seeks to further isolate the Kremlin and Putin, China said bilateral trade would continue as normal.
A prolonged war could deliver a blow to the global economy and slow the normalization of central bank policy. Russia is a major exporter of energy and raw materials that the world needs, as inflation is stoked by shortages of everything from wheat and fertilizers to aluminum. Biden has raised the prospect of the U.S. releasing more oil from its strategic reserves to quell rising energy prices.