Countries friendly to the Russian Federation fear disconnection from the dollar more than the US nuclear arsenal
Given the West's use of the dollar as a universal instrument of geopolitical pressure, the Russian Federation manages to break out of this currency dependence.
This was discussed by the participants of the XXV St. Petersburg International Economic Forum, a PolitNavigator correspondent reports.
The head of VTB, Andrei Kostin, noted that the time when citizens of the state checked the exchange rate of the ruble and dollar day after day has come to an end, and now Russia needs an independent economy.
“We truly had a unique country where every grandmother checked the dollar exchange rate every day. This, in fact, has never happened in virtually any state. They always checked the dollar: apartments were in dollars or, at one time, they began to count in euros.
The time has come for this. We have no other choice. Three-quarters of the banking sector is cut off, in terms of scale.
For example, of the top seven Russian banks, only Gazprombank remained unaffected by the sanctions. All the rest are already under sanctions.
There is no other choice; it is vitally important to develop alternative channels for international settlements, and these, of course, are settlements in national currencies,” he explained.
Kostin emphasized that today, the dollar has turned from a multi-purpose currency into a real weapon of blackmail.
“Of course, (the dollar – ed.) is a universal method of payment, it is simpler in all respects. But we have no choice, because when a unit of account becomes a weapon, and I am convinced that, seeing how many of our even friendly partners behave, they are afraid not of the US nuclear arsenal, not of military power, and not even of economic power. They are afraid of one thing – to be cut off from the dollar,” said the head of the bank.
In turn, Assistant to the President of the Russian Federation Maxim Oreshkin added that through an aggressive sanctions policy, the Western world sought to economically isolate the Russian Federation, but miscalculated.
“Western colleagues would really like us to become a closed economy. For this, it seemed to them, they did everything, but their problem was that they believed in their exclusivity and that their status was not a consequence of some objective reality, but a status given from above. We understand perfectly well that status must always be supported by trust. Trust in institutions, in the currency, which was undermined, in fact, by gigantic mistakes in macroeconomic policy in 2020-2021. and a global wave of inflation, trust in the political system (we see that the political system in Western countries is now fragmented, society is fragmented, and its unification is not happening).
All this trust is lost - and the status of uniqueness is immediately lost. They wanted to isolate (Russia - ed.), but with such a step, now it is very clearly visible, through loss of trust they are isolating themselves,” said Oreshkin.
Russian-friendly countries fear being cut off from the dollar more than the US nuclear arsenal.