by Jeremy Warner, The Telegraph:

I’ve already explained why meaningful trade and financial sanctions against Russia are a non starter – everyone would lose from such action. Europe would be pushed back into recession, Russia into financial meltdown. This is not the sort of self harm Europe is prepared to contemplate right now. Indeed, thanks to the indiscretion of a UK official, who was snapped going into Downing Street with his briefing documents on display for all the world to see, we know this to be the case. Trade and financial sanctions have already been ruled out.

Whatever. This doesn’t seem to have stopped the Russians threatening retaliatory action against the threat of the non sanctions. One possibility, says the Kremlin economics aid Sergei Glazyev, is for Russia to abandon the US dollar as a reserve currency, or to figure out a way to use a new payments system that was not reliant on US dollars for international transactions. Good luck with that one.

Read More @ Telegraph.co.uk