Russia

The United States and its allies plan new sanctions on more sectors of Russia's economy that are critical to sustaining its invasion of Ukraine, including military supply chains, Deputy U.S. Treasury Secretary Wally Adeyemo said yesterday, Reuters reported.

The conflict between Russia and Ukraine, which are exporters of steel products, will have a huge impact on global steel demand and trade if it lasts for a long time, the head of a Japanese steel industry group said on Tuesday, Reuters reported. "Even before the Ukraine crisis, we had faced three risk factors to dent steel demand -- China's slowdown, global chip shortage and soaring energy and natural resources prices," Japan Iron and Steel Federation Chairman Eiji Hashimoto told a news conference.

Japan will ban the export of high-end cars and other luxury goods to Russia in its latest response to the Russian invasion of Ukraine, the trade ministry said on Tuesday, Reuters reported. The partial ban on Russia-bound auto items, which account for more than half of Japan's exports to Russia, came after Prime Minister Fumio Kishida made a commitment to place more sanctions on Russia at a Group of Seven summit last week.

Russian airlines could be frozen out of the aircraft leasing market well beyond the Ukraine conflict, one of the industry's biggest players warned on Tuesday, blaming what executives have described as a default involving hundreds of Western jets, Reuters reported. Global leasing companies had until Monday to sever ties with Russian carriers under Western sanctions imposed over Moscow's invasion of Ukraine, but executives say only a fraction of the more than 400 jets directly involved have been returned.

All Irish lessors terminated their Russian airline leases by Monday's European Union sanctions deadline and have so far had limited success in recovering their aircraft, the representative body for the sector in Ireland said, Reuters reported. Aircraft Leasing Ireland (ALI), members of which include SMBC Aviation Capital, Avolon, Aircastle and AerCap Holdings , which is the world's biggest aircraft leasing company, said that all of its members have complied fully with the sanctions.

Germany released a report on Friday showing that the country was cutting its dependence on Russian energy sooner than many thought possible, the New York Times reported. Robert Habeck, the vice chancellor and economic minister, said Germany expected to cut its imports of Russian oil in half by the midsummer and nearly end the imports by end of this year. The need for Russian coal could be halved in “the coming weeks,” he said. And he estimated that Germany could be free of Russian gas by the middle of 2024, if all goes well.

Some holders of a $3 billion Russia bond received an overdue interest payment, signaling that the heavily sanctioned nation will once again sidestep a default, Bloomberg News reported. The $66 million interest payment started showing up in accounts on Thursday, according to two international bondholders, who asked not to be identified because they weren’t authorized to speak publicly. The payment was in dollars, one of the people said. A third bondholder reached Thursday said they had yet to see the payment.

German business morale plummeted in March as companies worried about rising energy prices, driver shortages and the stability of supply chains in the wake of the war in Ukraine, pointing to a possible future recession, a survey showed on Friday, Reuters reported. The Ifo institute said its business climate index dropped to 90.8 in March from a downwardly revised 98.5 in February. A Reuters poll of analysts had pointed to a March reading of 94.2.

After losing two years to the COVID-19 pandemic, shopkeepers in the heart of the Turkish Riviera had hoped for a strong tourism season this year to help keep their businesses afloat. But Russia’s war in Ukraine is fast dampening their spirits, the Associated Press reported. “We’re trying to earn our bread through tourism, but it looks like the war has finished off this (tourism) season, too,” Devrim Akcay said outside his clothing shop in the resort town of Belek, along the Mediterranean coast’s Antalya province.

Russian steel giant Severstal was racing against the clock on Wednesday to avoid becoming the country's first major corporate default since the Ukraine crisis began, with international payment lines snarled by sanctions, Reuters reported. Severstal, whose main shareholder Alexey Mordashov is one of a number of wealthy Russians now sanctioned by the European Union, has until the end of the day to get an already overdue $12.6 million loan 'coupon' payment to its creditors.