In an effort to cause a Russian default, the US Treasury banned Russia from making dollar debt payments from accounts at US financial institutions. Foreign banks had rejected USD bond payments, leaving Russia no choice but to send rubles to the National Settlement Depository. Neither of the bonds allows Russia the option to pay in rubles. The US blocking Russia from making USD bond interest payments to investors, can result in a technical default. Investors can claim Russia cannot afford to pay even though Russia is willing to pay in reality. At the same time, the ruble fully recovers from sanctions effects and strengthens even more than pre sanctions.

World is short of middle distillates, particularly of diesel, and now that's spilling over into jet fuel. Sanctions led to Russian feedstocks used to produce jet fuel and diesel becoming untouchable for part of the western world. China has also cut its oil product export quota, limiting jet fuel supplies. Argentina is grappling with shortages of diesel fuel that powers tractors and trucks just as the soybean and corn harvests pick up in the powerhouse crop exporter. Oil-rich Argentina produces plenty of diesel, but it also intervenes in energy markets.

EU announces new sanctions against Russia and Belarus:
- Embargo on coal imports from Russia
- Ban on Russian-operated vessels from accessing EU ports
- Ban on Belarusian road transport operators
- Export bans on advanced semiconductors, machinery and transport equipment

Coal futures contract prices skyrocket hitting all-time highs in Europe. Several E.U. countries have been importing more coal from Russia in recently, to bring down power generation costs due to the rise in natural gas prices. China purchases coal and oil from Russia in yuan. Recently, coking coal prices have been sending steel prices higher. It's about to get worse for steel manufacturing in Europe.

Finnish gov't reports a Russian aircraft violated Finnish air space off the coast of the Gulf of Finland for 3 minutes. Suspected (denial of service) (DDoS) cyberattack hit Finland's defence and foreign affairs ministries websites today. Nordea Bank has also reported disruptions to its online services affecting customer savings accounts. 2 days ago Finland’s gov't agreed to increase defense spending by 70% of 2 billion euros ($2.2 billion). Finnish government websites have a long history of being attacked/down despite a gov't report in Mar 2018 proving they had poor strategy for coordinating defences in the event of a large-scale attack. Finnish Politicians’ Email Accounts hacked in Dec 2020. Finnish ministry jobs site shutdown in Nov 2018. Finland gov't sites attacked in Aug 2018.

Russian Central Bank changes fixed price policy to account for stronger ruble. Now buys the precious metal at a “negotiated price”. The ruble jumped 20% this week alone. The bank lowered its benchmark interest rate from 20% to 17%. Cargoes of Russian Sokol crude from the Far East have sold out for next month in a sign that buyers are paying in yuan, ruble, gold or rupee. Russia’s flagship Urals crude, which is shipped from ports in the Baltic and Black Seas, has also been making its way to India and China. That’s led to the Biden administration warning India about aligning itself with Russia. Russia's allies are buying Russian crude at large discounts while the west pays exorbitant energy prices. Russia is changing trade dynamics with their allies. Any commodity of value can be used as payment to pay imports and debts.

Peru- Curfew imposed to quell anti-government protests. Protests sparked by rising fuel and fertilizer prices. Looting is reported in the capital city Lima. The government temporarily removed a tax that increases the prices of gasoline and diesel by 28% to 30%. Peru's 12-month inflation rate stood at 6.82% in March. Peru is the world's #2 copper producer. Prospect of losses for rice growers is due to fertilizer shortages driving protests.

Western media are publishing articles claiming fertilizer shortages are due to the war. No mention of the sanctions against Russia and Belarus, top exporters of ammonia based fertilizers and potash fertilizers. They are now blaming food shortages on Russia. Meanwhile, the US announced yesterday new sanctions on imports of additional types of fertilizer and pipe valves from Russia. US cattle farmers told to test their soils, to see if or what type of fertilizer would be required as a solution to farmers inability to fertilize their ryegrass. The EU's sanctions to reduce natural gas from Russia is forcing EU ammonia fertilizer factories to shut down. Presently, we are eating food (grains & root crops) produced in 2021. The real effects of these sanctions will begin to appear at year end into 2023.

ANNOUNCEMENT 1:
A special thank you to all subscribers participating on here. This channel evolved from a FB private group chat between a few friends that was censored, forcing us to move to Telegram. A special thank you to my local friends here in Trinidad and Tobago that supported me through all these years. I wrote this special article for all my subscribers and made it freely available on Substack. The article covers reserve currency history, geopolitics of the multi-polar world order and a different perspective on war of civilisations. This is simply a perspective and up for debate. Come to your own conclusions. You are free to share it.
Thank you,
Jonathan Mohan (Admin)

China's Premier Xi Jinping visits Yazhou Bay Seed Breeding Base. He stresses the crucial role of "Chinese seeds" in ensuring the country's food security. Investment in seed technology encouraged. In China, about 95% of staple food grain reaped in the country such as rice and barley are cultivated with self-developed seeds. Chinese people encouraged that homegrown seeds can provide the basic foundation for guaranteeing China’s food security. The Russian government has temporarily banned exports of sunflower seed and rapeseed in a bid to protect the domestic market. Exemption given for exports of grain seeds to Kazakhstan as it is necessary for variety renewal and variety change. Despite sanctions, western seed companies such as Bayer and Syngenta have not left Russia and continues to operate claiming global humanitarian concerns can result if they leave.

USDA - Most fertilizer prices have more than doubled from a year ago, with the price for anhydrous ammonia up 235%, nitrogen fertilizer urea up 149% and liquid nitrogen up 192%. US Farmers from various states; Texas, Tennessee, Louisiana, begin to have their fertilizer woes heard in US media reports. No mention of sanctions against Russian/Belarussian ammonia/potash fertilizer and natural gas exports. Natural gas being the feedstock for ammonia production. Hungary’s Nitrogénművek has temporarily halted ammonia production and may soon stop fertilizer production on soaring gas prices. China's Sinofert Holdings say sanctions have not affected them as they have potash reserves. Belarus and Russia are among the world’s top three producers of potash, and China is a major importer.

Kazakhstan stands to benefit from a possible European transition from Russian gas to domestic nuclear power. Kazakhstan is the 3rd largest supplier of uranium to Europe, supplying 19.2% in 2020, after Niger (20.3%) and Russia (20.2%). However, Much of the milled uranium from Kazakhstan travels through Russia before it is exported to global markets. US - Without re-examining its uranium supply chains, the U.S. energy market will be vulnerable similarly to Europe’s present situation. Nuclear power from 93 reactors currently generates 20 percent of the U.S. electric grid. Analysts get ready for bull run on uranium and miners. Japan plans to maximize the use of nuclear power to secure stable power supply. This is to prevent power supply shortages as Japan begins to sanction coal imports from Russia.

US consumer price index jumped 8.5% in March, the sharpest year-over-year increase since December 1981. Heading towards levels of the US 1970's energy crisis. In the last year; gasoline up 48%, used cars up 35.3%, groceries up 10%, including 18% increases for both bacon and oranges. Concerns arise over global bond markets correction which can trigger a financial crisis.

Costs of EVs due to increase. Benchmark prices of lithium, lithium carbonate, and lithium hydroxide have rapidly increased in recent months. Hovering at just $115 per ton in September 2020, the lithium has surged to $1,045 a ton in March 2022. That’s more than a nine-fold increase. Nickel, stainless steel, semiconductor and labour costs are rising. China has near-monopolistic control of cobalt refining capacity. EV demand could outpace proven reserves of cobalt, lithium, nickel, chromium, and zinc. Cobalt in lithium-ion batteries is obtained through child labour from the Congo, Africa.

Oil prices remain @ $100 range after correction late March/April. Western sanctions against Russia and logistical constraints have hampered trade. OPEC has warned that it would be impossible to replace potential supply losses from Russia and signalled that it would not pump more crude. China National Offshore Oil Corporation, (CNOOC) is preparing to exit the US, UK, and Canada because of sanctions concerns. CNOOC wanted to sell "marginal and hard to manage" assets in the three countries as top management found it "uncomfortable" to manage the Western assets. Due to fresh demand from India and long-term contracts with China, Russia continues to earn revenue from oil. The West’s sanctions on Russia’s oil trade is not enough as demand from elsewhere keeps the sector afloat, allowing the Russian government to continue raking in $1 billion a day from oil alone.

Oil India Limited, the Indian-government-owned oil and gas extraction company has been a victim of a cyberattack. Perpetrators demand $7.5 million in Bitcoin as ransom, through a note from the infected PC. Affected computers removed from the LAN connections. The company’s drilling operations unaffected. Online systems are down and they are working offline.

U.S. corn futures hit life-of-contract highs today, supported by tightening global grain supplies and an uncertain production outlook. Cold weather raises concerns about a slow start to U.S. planting. Yesterday, Chicago futures rallied to their highest close since 2012. Corn prices up 50% in last 6 months.

A reminder to all subscribers who missed my article written for you all. It covers reserve currency history, geopolitics of the multi-polar world order and a different perspective on war of civilisations. https://theparadigmshifts.substack.com/p/the-power-pendulum-swings-from-west?s=w

The Former Head of Bank of Japan’s financial settlement department, Hiromi Yamaoka, stated that CBDCs could end up destroying the economy. Concerns arise on using CBDC's to achieve negative interest rates. Japan-based trading company Mitsui & Co. plans on issuing a gold pegged cryptocurrency in the country. Brazil’s central bank has unveiled plans to start a CBDC pilot program that will be launched in 2022. Central Bank of Iran announced that it notified domestic banks and credit institutions about a series of regulations related to Iran’s ‘crypto-rial’, its forthcoming CBDC.

EU is working on broadening sanctions on Russia to include oil and gas embargoes but such measures would take "several months". Oil markets reacted immediately yesterday. WTI crude climbing to $107 per barrel. Europe is split on an immediate oil embargo, with the biggest economy—Germany—not willing to go for it, for now, saying an oil ban would plunge Germany, and Europe, into a deep recession. Russia plans to sell more to Asia, using SWIFT bypasses and bilateral currency swaps.

UK - Waitrose, Sainsburys and Morrisons have started rationing the amount of sunflower cooking oil customers can buy, due to major shortages. Customers are alerted to the new restrictions of only buying two bottles of cooking oil at a time, which are applicable for online orders as well. Prices of sunflower oil in the EU remain unprecedented after Russia announced plans to limit the amount of sunflower oil exported to 1.5 million tonnes. Russia is the second-largest producer of sunflower seed and sunflower oil in the world, after Ukraine. India's palm oil imports jumped 18.7% in March from the previous month, as traders moved to secure alternatives to sunflower oil. Video- Demand in Turkey, unavailability in Germany, demand in France.

Conti ransomware gang managed to forcefully shut down the internal IT systems of Nordex wind turbine company and brought down remote access to their turbines. Conti posted about the March 31 attack on April 11, but the information was made public on April 14. Nordex didn’t reveal what kind of cyber attack occurred in late March. Since Conti hasn’t started leaking any data, it could be that the cybercriminals group is negotiating ransom demand with the company. “Nordex turbines continued operating without restrictions and wind farm communication with grid operators and energy traders was, and remains, unaffected.” Nordex implemented alternative remote control services for the majority of its fleet.