And again, the "blackmail" here is that the countries in question are refusing to pay Russia for the natural gas, expecting them to just fork it over in return for nothing.
And the crux of the issue is that accessing rubles will either require these countries to violate NATO sanctions on Russia or pay outrageous money change fees to whomever is still holding Russian currency.
And Russia is demanding rubles for the same reason - payment in Euros or Dollars would be worthless in a Russian economy sanctioned out of the global finance network.
This is all about Western nations attempting to flex their FinTech muscle, only to discover you can't heat your home with a loan from a bank.
And again, the "blackmail" here is that the countries in question are refusing to pay Russia for the natural gas, expecting them to just fork it over in return for nothing.
Refusing to pay them in rubles!
And the crux of the issue is that accessing rubles will either require these countries to violate NATO sanctions on Russia or pay outrageous money change fees to whomever is still holding Russian currency.
And Russia is demanding rubles for the same reason - payment in Euros or Dollars would be worthless in a Russian economy sanctioned out of the global finance network.
This is all about Western nations attempting to flex their FinTech muscle, only to discover you can't heat your home with a loan from a bank.