CURRENT EVENTS February |

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“… Unrest did indeed break out in many parts of Mexico as loyalists to El Mencho, the leader of the Jalisco New Generation Cartel, set up roadblocks, torched buses and stores, and attacked gas stations in retaliation for his slaying.

… Experts said that, in the case of El Mencho's killing, the fake news was being spread at surprising speed not only by unsuspecting users but also in some cases by the cartel itself, in efforts to make its retaliatory wave of violence appear greater and more terrifying than it really was.

"They are trying to show that the Mexican government doesn't have control over the country," said Jane Esberg, assistant professor at the University of Pennsylvania, who has studied how Mexican criminal groups use social media.…”
 
nycfan said:
SOTU Address coincides with fourth anniversary of the newest Russian invasion of Ukraine.

IMG_5234.jpeg

🇺🇦 🎁—> Russia Remade Its Economy for War, but It’s Come at a Huge Cost
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“… Nearly 40 percent of Russia’s federal budget is now devoted to the military and security. Another 9 percent goes to interest payments on the debt that Mr. Putin has decided to take on to finance the war, a departure from years of tight fiscal discipline.

Russia is quickly burning through its National Wealth Fund, a rainy-day financial cushion that Mr. Putin had built up using oil and gas revenues. The fund’s liquid reserves were worth about $55 billion this month, down from $113 billion before the war.

… “The war is really eating up a lot of resources,” said Janis Kluge, a Russia expert at the German Institute for International and Security Affairs in Berlin. “If it hadn’t started, they would have had so much money to spend, simply.”

In addition to being a money pit, the war has shattered Russia’s remaining ties with the West and made it less attractive for investors. Foreign direct investment has cratered. Domestic investment has been crimped by high interest rates aimed at taming inflation, in an economy pumped up by heavy military spending.…”
 
nycfan said:
“… Nearly 40 percent of Russia’s federal budget is now devoted to the military and security. Another 9 percent goes to interest payments on the debt that Mr. Putin has decided to take on to finance the war, a departure from years of tight fiscal discipline.

Russia is quickly burning through its National Wealth Fund, a rainy-day financial cushion that Mr. Putin had built up using oil and gas revenues. The fund’s liquid reserves were worth about $55 billion this month, down from $113 billion before the war.

… “The war is really eating up a lot of resources,” said Janis Kluge, a Russia expert at the German Institute for International and Security Affairs in Berlin. “If it hadn’t started, they would have had so much money to spend, simply.”

In addition to being a money pit, the war has shattered Russia’s remaining ties with the West and made it less attractive for investors. Foreign direct investment has cratered. Domestic investment has been crimped by high interest rates aimed at taming inflation, in an economy pumped up by heavy military spending.…”
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“… The war has also exacerbated Russia’s demographic crisis. As many as 325,000 troops have died on the battlefield, according to a recent report by the Center for Strategic and International Studies in Washington. Some studies predict that the Russian population could, in pessimistic scenarios, drop below 100 million by 2100, down from a prewar population of roughly 145 million.

… Russia’s huge military spending in the first three years of the war led to an economic boom that defied Western expectations of a collapse in the face of international sanctions.

Now, the economy is beginning to descend from that high as it faces state spending cutbacks and big strains in the labor market. Russia’s oil and gas revenues dropped by almost a quarter last year, as global prices fell and sanctions imposed discounts on Russian crude.

While the downturn is not yet severe enough to force Mr. Putin to end the war, Moscow has raised taxes and taken other measures to shore up its finances.

Russia’s economic future depends largely on what terms Moscow can negotiate in any peace deal and how effectively it can reintegrate the nation into the global economy.…”
 
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But “Russia’s inflation trajectory demonstrated remarkable deceleration in 2025, closing the year at 5.59% year-on-year—substantially below the elevated 9.52% recorded in 2024. Analysis by SberCIB Investment Research shows this outcome surpassed both the Central Bank’s October forecast of 6.5–7% and market consensus expectations, with their projections pointing to further moderation in 2026.”

sber.bank.in

Russia’s Inflation: Drivers, Outlook and Risks in 2026 | Sberbank Branch in India

A detailed breakdown of Russia’s inflation dynamics, growth slowdown and monetary policy with practical insights for India–Russia business
sber.bank.in sber.bank.in
 
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nycfan said:
SOTU Address coincides with fourth anniversary of the newest Russian invasion of Ukraine.

IMG_5234.jpeg

🇺🇦 🎁—> Russia Remade Its Economy for War, but It’s Come at a Huge Cost
Click to expand...
I read several years ago (before its invasion of Ukraine) that Russia, with about 145 million people, has the same GNP as Texas, which has just 31 million people. Russia's economy is a mess and has been for many years, and many Russians endure terrible poverty and hardship on a regular basis. One of the Russian military recruiting commercials when the war with Ukraine started showed a father who was so poor that he couldn't afford to get his teen daughter a cellphone and she hated him, but when he joined the Russian Army he finally made enough to get her a cellphone and so she loved him again. I've also read that it's an incredibly corrupt society from top to bottom, a kleptocracy fueled by Putin's administration, which is probably one reason why Trump loves him so. It's a failed nation-state in many respects, but it's still got lots of nukes and a big military and lots of oil and natural resources so they can still play at being a major world power, even while a great many Russians live in squalid, poverty level conditions.
 
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