What the world's economy did as Russia faced isolation
A look back at the commercial and financial measures that built up around Russia in the days before 8 March 2022.
How far had economic pressure on Russia travelled by 8 March 2022? The reports of the preceding days showed payment networks, technology firms, lenders and commodity markets all reacting to the invasion of Ukraine.
Payments and finance
On 5 March 2022, Visa and Mastercard suspended operations in Russia. Visa said it would cut off transactions over the coming days, and that once a full ban was in place, bank cards issued in Russia would no longer work abroad.
The same day, President Putin signed a decree allowing sovereign and corporate debts owed to creditors from "unfriendly countries" to be settled in rubles rather than foreign currencies, at the exchange rate set by the Central Bank of Russia. The list of such countries was to be determined within two days.
Earlier, on 2 March, the World Bank suspended all its programmes in Russia and Belarus in response to the invasion. The European Union said the same day that it would suspend deliveries of euro banknotes to Russia from 12 March, with exemptions for private persons and their family members in Russia, and for diplomatic missions with legal immunity.
Companies step back
On 5 March, Samsung Electronics suspended all shipments to Russia, citing current geopolitical developments. Samsung was the largest supplier of smartphones in Russia, with a 30% market share.
On 4 March, Alphabet, the parent company of Google, stopped all advertisement sales in Russia. It followed similar steps by Twitter and Snap Inc. Russian regulators had demanded that the company stop showing what they called false political information about Ukraine.
Metals markets react
By 7 March, the effects were visible in commodity prices. Aluminium and nickel reached record prices on the London exchange, at about $4,000 and $55,000 per tonne respectively, and nickel rose 90% in intraday trading. Copper hit a new high of $10,845 per tonne, while palladium reached $3,440 per ounce. Russia is a substantial producer of all of these metals, and the market expected shortages as further sanctions hit the country.
Taken together, the measures reported up to 8 March 2022 touched card payments, consumer electronics, online advertising, development lending, cash supplies and raw materials.
