India buys oil from Russia at a discount and resells it to Western countries. Russian oil will become even more attractive for New Delhi after the EU introduces a price ceiling – Bloomberg According to analysts from Kpler, in January 2023, India shipped about 89,000 barrels of gasoline and diesel per day to New York – this is a four-year maximum. Against the backdrop of sanctions imposed against Russia, India buys oil from Moscow at a discount, and then refines and sells it to the US and Europe. According to Bloomberg, India’s actions do not contradict the policy of the European Union – refined oil is not considered as oil of “Russian origin”. Moreover, India’s policy allows the West to cut Russia’s revenues and avoid a supply crisis. @banksta
***
Russia’s oil and gas export revenues fell by about $8 billion (more than 565 billion rubles) in January, Fatih Birol, head of the International Energy Agency (IEA), said. The decline in the first month of 2023 will be almost 30% compared to the same period last year, said Birol, quoted by Reuters. @banksta
***
The Central Bank reported a fraudulent scheme with QR codes in public places. Fraudsters began to place QR codes in public places, when scanning which a person is offered to help with registration of social benefits, demanding personal and financial data from him, German Zubarev, Deputy Chairman of the Bank of Russia, said. @banksta
***
Nouriel Roubini listed the problems of the dollar as a reserve currency, but recalled that there is no alternative yet, as Beijing controls the yuan too much. He reported about the decline of the dollar in 10 years. @banksta
***
Today at 12:00 Moscow time, the experts of the largest broker from Armenia will go live. ???? Leading Armbrok experts will talk about the progress of Russian corporate Eurobond substitutions and market trends. A separate promising topic is the purchase of shares and depositary receipts of Russian companies at a discount from foreign investors. Traders will review the instruments in which there is the greatest interest from buyers and sellers. ⏰ In 20 minutes you will learn a lot of interesting ideas and options for their implementation. ???? Armbrok is the oldest investment company in Armenia, founded in 1994. It provides brokerage services and gives access to all major global markets. Armbrok accepts all major currencies, including rubles, which can be converted into dollars at the exchange rate. Friendly jurisdiction for Russians, there are no restrictions on financial transactions from Western countries and the Russian Federation. Due to the high demand for services, Armbrok accepts clients from USD 500 thousand. Link to the broadcast and its subsequent recording: =ljyishl07mc We are waiting for you!
***
“We are not such a rich country to have at least one parking space for one apartment,” said Deputy Prime Minister Marat Khusnullin. Therefore, when building new housing, he recommended that the regions reduce the standard standard for determining parking spaces “one apartment – one parking space”. The Deputy Prime Minister predicted a long decline in the auto industry and auto sales. @banksta
***
The collapsed FTX exchange sent confidential letters to politicians demanding by the end of the month that the ~$93M donations donated by Sam Bankman-Freed and other FTX executives be returned by the end of February. @banksta
***
Russia in 2022 ranked fourth in the world in terms of gold and foreign exchange reserves. China’s reserves totaled $3.31 trillion, Japan was second with $1.27 trillion, Switzerland third with $924 billion. Russia ended the year in fourth place with $582 billion. India came fifth with $563 billion in reserves. @ banksta
***
The price of oil by 2024 may rise sharply due to a shortage of supply, analysts at Goldman Sachs predict. There is a lack of production capacities on the world market, because of this, the cost of raw materials will change from $80 per barrel to $100 and more. @banksta
***
The Chinese spent their government subsidies in 9 seconds, writes Global Times. Chinese cities have given away 180 million digital yuan (about $26.5 million) in subsidies and coupons to encourage the use of digital currency on Chinese New Year. @banksta
***
In December 2022, $422.9 million was transferred from Russia to Armenia, which is five times more than in the same period of the previous year, according to the statistics of the Central Bank of Armenia. In total, a little less than $3.6 billion was received in this direction in a year. For comparison, in 2021, only $865.6 million was received from Russia in the republic. @banksta
***
Europe’s largest copper producer Aurubis AG fell 5.3% after reporting a roughly 24% drop in quarterly earnings due to high energy prices. @banksta
***
Former Israeli Prime Minister Bennett says Western leaders have blocked a peace deal between Ukraine and Russia that he almost negotiated at Zelenskiy’s request in March. Bennett says there were good chances for a deal. @banksta
***
⚡️Today is THAT DAY — we start issuing SberPay payment stickers. To begin with, we will issue 100 thousand pieces for free for testing! In fact, the sticker is a debit Sbercard Mir. You can stick it on your smartphone to pay like before in shops, cafes and even withdraw cash. And also, get up to 30% cashback with bonuses from SberSpasibo. In general, a must-have for those who always forget their wallet with regular cards. By the way, during the test we will conduct surveys and interviews that will help us make the payment sticker even more convenient for you. Rather, issue a sticker for free in Sberbank Online, and receive it at any bank office in your city or by courier in Moscow and St. Petersburg. Hurry up, after the announcement of the sticker, we received a flurry of calls from those who wished. We really hope that there will be enough for everyone ???? @sberbank
***
In Spain, they began to treat addiction to crypto trading. Rehab center The Balance has added treatment for cryptocurrency trading, which has become a new type of addiction, to its list of services. In addition to therapy, the treatment program includes massage, yoga, cycling, your own butler and chef, and a $75,000 service bill. @banksta
***
Despite the abundance of domestic developments, the problem of import substitution in Russian banks has not disappeared. According to the Program Committee of the banking IT forum FinCore-2023, there is an acute shortage in the financial sector: ???? Virtualization in infrastructure and basic IT services, comparable to VMware. ???? Solutions for mobile devices comparable in security to MobileIron. ???? Security and networking solutions to replace Cisco. ???? An issue tracker that can really replace the Jira that has become the standard. ???? Full-fledged alternatives to solutions for the life cycle of transactions – Calypso and Murex. ???? Scoring, antifraud and AML/CFT solutions to replace FICO, SAS and Hunter. ???? Alternatives to solutions for scanning threats in program codes from Checkmarx and solutions for network microsegmentation for the Zero Trust concept from AlgoSec and others. PSB, Yandex.Cloud, Uralsib and others will share cases of solving problems with import substitution, reveal insights and the latest practices of IT architecture transformation. In a programme: ???? A Visionary Discussion on the Digital Architecture of Tomorrow ???? Real experience and practice of transition to import-independent software and equipment???? The latest cases of AI, ML, RPA, LowCode and microservice technologies???? The edge of what is permitted when transferring infrastructure, capacities and core solutions to cloud services ???? Innovations in development environments, in container platforms and much more. Come February 16 to the “Start Hub” on Red October. You will be able to personally communicate with leading IT directors and IT architects, directors of digital transformation, heads of digital and other IT departments in companies from the financial and related industries. Program and registration link =tg_fincore2023_banksta_anons2
***
The most attractive business: where they invest more often Avito calculated which franchises and ready-made businesses were most often interested in 2022. Demand for them increased by 16%. ???? Among the ready-made businesses, trade and catering are the most in demand, they have more than 36% in this category. ???? The fastest growing demand was for the dental and medical business (+90%), hotels and recreation centers (+84%) and beauty industry companies (+71%). ???? Interested in buying a franchise 10% more often. Dentistry and medicine, public catering, hotels and recreation centers are among the leaders here. According to Ilya Dudkovsky, head of the Ready-Made Business and Franchising and Equipment for Business categories at Avito, areas where there are new opportunities to develop business, such as medicine and tourism, are increasingly in demand. Russian companies are entering franchises dominated by foreign business. Investors are also changing their approach: “On the one hand, a class of investors has formed who are ready to consider buying and developing a business in order to diversify income. On the other hand, the attractiveness of investments in ready-made businesses from professional investors has grown, who see a new tool in the acquisition of companies.”
***
The Turkish authorities have suspended the pumping of oil to its export terminal in Ceyhan on the Mediterranean coast because of the earthquake, Bloomberg reports citing a source. @banksta
***
Bloomberg: Russian crude oil exports to China, India and Turkey hit a new high of 3.29 million barrels per day in the four weeks ending February 3, 2023. Exports of Russian oil by sea to European countries fell to 125,000 barrels per day. @banksta
***
Russian Finance Minister Anton Siluanov admitted that he sometimes “climbs” into a loan using a credit card. “I have a deposit in the bank. I have a card on which I receive a salary. On this card, if I receive a salary, I send part of the money to a deposit account in a bank, and part remains on the card. And if I have a purchase, and it turns out that I need to pay more than my account balance, then I get into a loan, ”explained Siluanov. The salary of the minister, according to the Ministry of Finance, for 1 month is about 1.73 million rubles. The total amount of income for the year is 98 million rubles. @banksta
***
The Russian Ministry of Finance in January 2023 for the first time sold a small amount of gold (3.6 tons) from the National Wealth Fund (NWF) in order to cover the budget deficit. Previously, the Ministry of Finance mainly bought precious metal. @banksta
***
Russia imported 10% more wine in 2022 compared to 2021. Logistics problems did not prevent Italy from increasing supplies by 20% and remaining in first place. Explosive growth was shown by Uzbekistan. @banksta
***
Global Times: US transfer of Russian assets to Ukraine will undermine America’s credibility, US sanctions against Russia are illegal and represent unilateral actions not authorized by the UN. On the one hand, the US profits from the conflict, on the other hand, the state seeks to achieve its geopolitical goal through conflict. @banksta
***
In January, the Russian budget deficit became the largest since 1998. It amounted to a record 1.76 trillion rubles, the Finance Ministry said. Such a deficit was the result of a 35% reduction in revenues in annual terms – to 1.36 trillion rubles. @banksta
***
Bloomberg announced a new record for offshore oil supplies from Russia. Russia is reducing the amount of oil going through pipelines to Europe and is increasing its offshore supplies of raw materials. However, due to the decline in Russian oil prices, export revenues are still declining, according to Bloomberg. @banksta
***
The record grain harvest in 2022 and the logistical difficulties associated with the sanctions have led to the accumulation of surpluses of grain unsold by farmers in Russia. There are tens of millions of tons in storage – we can talk about reserves worth 260 billion rubles, analysts at Yakov and Partners (formerly McKinsey) estimated. These stocks are at risk, usually associated with long-term storage and “eat” a significant part of the margin, analysts warn. To avoid risks, Russia, according to analysts, will need to export every month the volume of grain close to the record – more than 4 million tons. @banksta
***
Last year, Russian Railways’ freight traffic to the East exceeded that to the West by 4 million tons. In addition, freight traffic with friendly countries increased by 23%, while with unfriendly countries it fell by almost 40%. @banksta
***
The European Union excluded from sanctions oil products produced from Russian oil outside the Russian Federation. In addition, the price ceiling will not apply when mixing Russian oil products and products from other countries. @banksta
***
The Prosecutor General’s Office appealed the release from the pre-trial detention center of Eduard Kim, a 76-year-old defendant in a criminal case on a particularly large embezzlement of 100 million rubles from Arsenal Bank, whose shareholders were several generals and heroes of Russia at once. Earlier, the court concluded that the investigators and the FSB did not provide evidence confirming the bankster’s atrocities and was ready to release him. @banksta