Just what impact that will have on local economies remains to be seen. But this is a case of one side wants the fuel and the other side wants to be paid.
Russia's Vladimir Putin told reporters that a deal ensuring gas supplies "at least for the winter" had been reached after a final one-on-one meeting with Ukraine's Petro Poroshenko, which followed talks attended by European leaders.
"We agreed on all the parameters of this deal," Putin said, but he urged European countries to help Ukraine meet a debt for gas, which he said stood at $4.5 billion.
The agreement followed a hectic series of meetings on the margins of a summit between Asian and European leaders in Milan at which Europeans showed no signs of agreeing to lift sanctions against Moscow imposed over the Ukraine crisis.
The news of a possible deal comes on top of Moodys, the bond rating agency, cutting Russia's credit rating to the second lowest investment grade, acording to Bloomberg.
Citing sluggish growth prospects, Moody's downgraded the rating one level form Baa2 to Basa1 nd did not change its negative outlook for Russia's future. Last April Standard & :Poor downgraded the debt to BBB-, a notch below Moody's.
The ruble has lost 13 percent against the dollar in the past three months, more than any other currencies tracked by Bloomberg, extending its drop this year to 19 percent. Foreign reserves have declined 11 percent this year to a four-year low of $452 billion as the central bank acted to shore up the ruble, Bloomberg also noted, while declining energy prices have been putting more pressure on Russia.
http://www.businessinsider.com/these-6-countries-will-be-screwed-if-oil-prices-keep-falling-2014-10?
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