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andersaslund.bsky.social
Economist & author, specializing in the economics of Eastern Europe, especially Russia & Ukraine.
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Russia's Central Bank cuts its high interest rate of 21% since October 2024 to still high 20%, while official inflation has abated at 9.8%. meduza.io/en/news/2025...

A few thoughts on Russia's war against Ukraine: 1. Trump does whatever he can to support Putin. His problem is that most republicans support Ukraine, so he gives them an opportunity to cheat themselves to claim that Trump supports Ukraine. /1

My understanding of the Trump-Musk conflict: 1. Musk considers that he bought Trump's presidency & that Trump should behave as his obedient servant. 2. Trump acknowledges that Musk bought him & allowed dozens of regulatory concerns to lapse & $20 billion of gov contracts. /1

The Ukraine National Bank left its key policy rate unchanged at 15.5% at a meeting yesterday, in line with the Bank’s earlier forward guidance. The NBU noted that headline inflation likely peaked in May, accelerating from 15.1% y-o-y in April (Dragon Capital).

Note: Trump's tariffs are NOT "reciprocal" but unilateral. Call them unilateral!

Trump claims to have established "reciprocal", that is, "mutual" tariffs, but they are entirely unilateral - imposed by the US for no good reason & without negotiations. Journalists! Call them unilateral, because that is what they are & not "reciprocal"!

Trump: "The easiest way to save money in our Budget, Billions and Billions of Dollars, is to terminate Elon's Governmental Subsidies and Contracts". This sounds as a Trump confession of corruption. Why did Trump allow all this government funding for Musk?

The main impact of Trump’s four long phone calls with Putin appears to have been to encourage Putin to bomb Ukraine more and maintain maximum demands.

US Treasury: "Today, Secretary of the Treasury Scott Bessent...reaffirmed the United States’ support for Ukrainian sovereignty and emphasized the United States’ dedication to secure a lasting, durable peace." The US has apparently dropped its prior commitment to Ukraine's territorial integrity.

Trump’s mad economic policies have put Fed in a hopeless position: Trump is driving up inflation and unemployment with his madcap policies. Fed can do nothing in this stagflation. Higher interest rates would boost unemployment, lower would boost inflation. =nothing to do.

Putin’s reaction to Ukraine’s successful raids on Russian air bases is so predictable: Nothing but a senior general happens to die by falling out of a window.

OECD: "US inflation is now expected to rise to nearly 4 per cent by the end of 2025 and remain above the Fed’s target in 2026, meaning the central bank will probably wait until next year before lowering interest rates" www.ft.com/content/b8a5...

The two biggest protectionist events in the world after World War II were: 1. Brexit. 2. Trump's second term. Don't call anybody who voted for either a libertarian or liberal! Fascist or at least protectionist appears more appropriate.

Remember all the GOP congressmen who empowered Trump to destroy the flourishing US economy that Biden left behind! Oust them all!

Isn't it clear by now to everybody that Trump is a disaster to the US economy? What have all you destructive billionaires to say about how you contributed to Trump's destruction of the US economy, democracy & rule of law? Aren't you ashamed of yourselves?

I listened to Trump's Chairman of the Council of Economic Advisors Stephen Miran on Bloombergs today. Without evidence, he claimed the US economy is set to do better than everybody believes but failed to offer one single figure, since everything is uncertain (=Trump). Indeed!

The US is feeling the impact of Trump's anti-American economic policies. The OECD now predicts "US growth will slow particularly sharply, sliding from 2.8 per cent last year to just 1.6 per cent in 2025." Why does Trump harm the US economy? www.ft.com/content/b8a5...

The West is losing the information war because Trump and the GOP support the Kremlin. They have abolished all the US defenses and their media support the Kremlin.

@FT: "The close relationship between US government bond yields and the dollar has broken down as investors cool on American assets in response to President Donald Trump’s volatile policymaking." The market realizes what a disaster Trump is. www.ft.com/content/9ca0...

JPMorgan Chase chief executive Jamie Dimon said on Friday that he had cautioned regulators: “You are going to see a crack in the bond market.” “I’m telling you this is going to happen. And you are going to panic. I’m not going to panic. We’ll be fine.” www.ft.com/content/8c36...

Can any big company invest in the US when Trump persistently destabilizes their conditions with wild decisions about trade & immigration? Trump is making it nearly impossible to invest in the US. If the republicans in Congress had any sense of responsibility they would stop him.

"Peter Kažimír, governor of the National Bank of Slovakia and a member of the European Central Bank’s governing council, was convicted of bribery on Thursday and fined €200,000...Kažimír, an old political ally of Slovakia’s Prime Minister Robert Fico." www.ft.com/content/f510...

Gillian Tett: Trump's tax bill would enable the US Treasury to impose penalties on “applicable persons” from “discriminatory foreign countries” by increasing US federal income tax and withholding rates by up to 20 percentage points on their US investments. www.ft.com/content/96e9...

"US goods imports plunged by nearly a fifth in April in the biggest fall on record as President Donald Trump’s tariffs prompted companies to slam the brakes on shipments to the world’s biggest economy." www.ft.com/content/e518...

It is astounding that the US with the most educated & talented people in the world has elected a verified moron as president who is running the eminent Biden economy aground for no other reasons than his own ignorance & uncontrolled anger. www.ft.com/content/d9c7...

This Trump statement is truly outrageous. Trump appears to say that he helps Putin in his mass killing of civilians in Ukraine. The republicans in Congress who claim to support Ukraine had better ask him to clarify this statement.

As usual, Ed Luce gets its right: "America’s rising ‘moron premium’" The cost of having an almighty idiot as president is enormous & rising. The US treasury market can still stop his madness, but only episodically. I am pessimistic: US default is possible. www.ft.com/content/d9c7...

This Trump statement should disqualify him from ever be taken seriously: “I’m not happy with what Putin is doing. He’s killing a lot of people, and I don’t know what the hell happened to Putin.” Trump has told us he is a complete idiot. We had better believe him. www.wsj.com/opinion/dona...

It is frustrating to read most American comments on Trump. They tend to think that Trump is a serious president favoring the US. Instead, they should take the lunacy he utters seriously. At best, Trump pursues his own PR, but more likely it is just lunacy. /1

Today, the US has 1.1 million foreign students, offering the country vast sums of money & rich intelligence. Soon, Trump will minimize their number & intelligence will go elsewhere. Nobody can recommend any foreigner to go to the US to study any longer. What a devastation!

My interview with Ian Masters on Trump's tariffs and the great US financial vulnerability after Trump has weakened the trust in US treasuries.

Unlike Trump, both the chair of the Harvard corporation and the President of Harvard are Jewish. What is his problem? Tolerance and freedom.

This post alone should suffice to activate 25th Amendment.

As stagflation - high inflation and minimal growth - hit the US, remember that the US economy was never as good as in January 2025 just before Trump the destroyer became president.