Posts
Ukraine
Only Has Enough Gasoline For A Month
25
March, 2014
Nothing
to see here, move along. While it appears the Russians are willing to
pay the price of modest sanctions from the west to 'liberate' their
fellow countrymen, the fallout from further tension with Ukraine
could "boomerang" once again on the divided nation. As RBC
Ukraine reports,
the Minister of Energy and Coal Industry Yuriy Prodan said at a press
conference today that "oil
reserves will last for 28-29 days" in Ukraine.
After that, the negotiation begins as Ukraine already owes billions
for previously delivered gas - as Ukraine's storage levels more than
halved in the last 3 months.
Stocks of petroleum products in Ukraine will last for 28-29 days, said at today's press conference, the Minister of Energy and Coal Industry Yuriy Prodan.
"Speaking on the situation with oil, then ensure there is quite stable. Today oil reserves will last for 28-29 days," - he said, the " RBC-Ukraine . "
At the same time, the Minister noted the significant risk reduction in the supply and rising gas prices. As of March 25, 2014 in Ukrainian underground gas storage facilities located 7 billion cubic meters of gas.
"Up there can be about 2 billion is not the quantity that scares experts, it would be possible to hold only a week. It all depends on what kind of regime will be whether we can take about 20 million cubic meters. Meters of gas to reverse and so on "- said Prodan.
According to the company "Ukrtransgaz" abnormally warm winter 2013 2014. has reduced gas extraction from underground storage by an average of 37% compared to the same period last year: it was 60 million cubic meters per day.
In late December 2013. occupied at the time the post of Minister of Energy and Coal Industry of Edward Stawicki reported that Ukrainian gas reserves in underground storage is 16.5 billion cubic meters.
We
suspect any further military intervention will only crimp this supply
even faster.
Showdown in Ukraine: Putin’s Quest for Ports, Oil, Pipelines and Gas
25
March, 2014
Yes,
Russia is guilty of meddling in Ukraine, but then again so are the
United States and the European Union. The major difference is that
far less was said and much less reported by the international media
over the Americans’ and Europeans’ interference than of Russia’s
actions and the reactions it caused.
Where
Russia is involved many in the West believe that one only needs to
scratch the surface to see traces of the old Soviet Union begin to
resurface. After all, Russian President Vladimir Putin is a former
KGB officer. The truth is much more complicated than that: or perhaps
somewhat simpler.
The
Cold War that divided the East and West maybe over but the old
rivalry still lingers. The rivalry between the West and Russia is no
longer one over diverging political philosophies, but purely over
resources – and the capitalistic gains they produce from mainly
oil, gas and pipelines.
The
West and in particular the United States seems to be suffering from
collective memory disorder and have forgotten all the mud they
slapped onto Putin’s face during the past 15 or so years. Or at
least they expected him to forget and forgive
.
But
then again Russian troops did move in to grab control of Crimea,
taking over the territory from the Ukrainians. You can counter that
argument by pointing to the US and NATO, who not only interfered, but
swallowed former Soviet domains bringing them into the North Atlantic
alliance, pushing NATO closer to Russia’s borders.
Yes,
Russia needs access to warm water ports for its Black Sea fleet and
many analysts also believe that this is a major issue of concern for
Moscow, which it is. But the plot, as they say, thickens.
There
is also another reason for Putin’s intervention in Ukraine and that
has to do with Russia elbowing for dominance of the very lucrative
and strategically important “energy corridors.”
That is very likely to be the major reason why Putin is willing to risk going to war with the West over Crimea, the pipelines that traverses the Caucasus and the oil and natural gas these pipelines carry westwards to Europe.
Given
the geography of the region there are only so many lanes where the
pipelines can be laid; and most of them transit through Ukraine.
Others travel across Azerbaijan and Turkey. Most of Western Europe’s
gas and much of Eastern Europe’s gas travels through Ukraine.
If
Russia has vested interest in “recolonizing” Ukraine, the United
States on the other hand has its own interests in Ukraine and other
former Soviet areas.
What
is going on today is nothing short of a race for control of what’s
going to dominate the energy markets over the next two or three
decades: the energy corridors from Central Asia, the Caucuses and
through Russia and Ukraine.
As
stated in a report published by the Woodrow Wilson International
Center for Scholars, “the proclamation of independence, the
adoption of state symbols and a national anthem, the establishment of
armed forces and even the presence on Ukrainian territory of nuclear
missiles—all important elements of independent statehood—amount
little if another power, Russia, controls access to fuel without
which Ukraine cannot survive economically.
Related
Article: This
Week in Energy: How Would LNG Get to Ukraine?
That
same report denotes that "Ukraine's strategic location between
the main energy producers (Russia and the Caspian Sea area) and
consumers in the Eurasian region, its large transit network, and its
available underground gas storage capacities," make the country
"a potentially crucial player in European energy transit" -
a position that will "grow as Western European demands for
Russian and Caspian gas and oil continue to increase."
Ukraine's
dependence on Russian energy imports has had "negative
implications for US strategy in the region."
As
long as Russia controls the flow of oil and gas it has the upper
hand. Russia's Gazprom currently controls almost a fifth of the
world's gas reserves.
More
than half of Ukraine’s and nearly 30% of Europe's gas comes from
Russia. Moscow wants to try and keep things going its way;
Washington and Brussels find it in their interests to try and alter
that by creating multiple channels for central Asian and Caspian oil
to flow westwards.
Ukraine today finds itself in the center of the new East-West dispute.
Ironically,
the very assets that make Ukraine an important player in the new
geopolitical game being played out between Washington and Moscow is
also its greatest disadvantage.
By
Claude Salhani of Oilprice.com
The
Latest Heist: US Quietly
Snatches the Ukraine’s Gold
Reserves
As
the dust settles in Kiev, another money trail has been revealed
21
March, 2014
According
to reports out of Kiev (see links below), the US has quietly
transfers 33 tons of Ukrainian gold out of the country and back to
vaults in the US.
Presumably, this sovereign wealth transfer would be
counted as partial “collateral” for a fresh round of IMF, US FED,
and ECB paper debt that is currently being organised for dumping into
the Ukraine’s economic black hole.
Multiple
inquiries to US Federal Reserve administrators into the location of
the Ukraine’s gold have been met with the proverbial ‘pass the
buck’, making tracking and tracking the final resting place of
these 33 tonnes very difficult indeed – but one can expect that the
NY Fed is probably the institution who has masterminded this
financial heist.
Note
how gold flows into New York, but has difficulty flowing out of US
private banking hands as is the case with the ‘confiscation’ of
Germany’s gold. Numerous attempts by Bundesbank to repatriate its gold reserves have been met with a brick wall, and to date, Germany
has only recovered a miniscule 5 tonnes directly from the NY Fed –
out of the total 674 tonnes (an additional 32 tonnes were recovered
via French central bank).
It’s
worth pointing out here that when NATO sacked Libya in 2011, one of
the first items that came into question was the gold in Libya’s state-run central bank. Prior to the NATO takeover of that country,
Libya had one of the highest per capita gold reserves in the world,
alongside Lebanon, giving Libya a distinct advantage should it carry
out former Libyan leader Muammar Muhammad al-Gaddafi’s long-term
financial transition to a gold-backed Libyan Dinar. As you can
imagine, this is no longer the case in Tripoli.
Additionally,
like Libya, both Syria and Iran are two of the world’s last
remaining nation states who both have state-run central banks and
gold reserves which fall outside of the world’s private central
banking syndicate.
Needless
to say, you can see an obvious pattern emerging here.
And
the story continues…
The
Big Lie + What Happened To Ukraine’s Gold?
By
PM Fund Manager Dave Kranzler
Investment
Research Dynamics
The
Big Lie is that Central Banks don’t care about gold. Nothing could
be further from the truth.
Ben
Bernanke, more than once, claimed that he didn’t understand gold.
When Ron Paul asked Bernanke in front of Congress why Central Banks
own gold if it’s irrelevant, Bernanke flippantly suggested that it
was out of tradition. In both cases Bernanke was lying and he knew
it.
In
comparison, Greenspan seemed to have some respect for the laws of
economics and – at least that I can recall – never would outright
state that gold was not an economic factor. Greenspan lied as much
as Bernanke did about everything else but he never committed himself
to lie about gold. Most of you have probably read Greenspan’s 1966
essay, “Gold and Economic Freedom” (linked). I have read it
several times because it explains as well as anything out there why
gold works as a currency and why Government-issued fiat currency does
not.
What
I find amazing about The Big Lie about Central Banks and gold is that
if gold really is considered to be irrelevant, the how come Central
Banks – especially the Fed – are so secretive about their gold
storage and trading activities? What’s even more amazing is that
no one other than Ron Paul and GATA asks them about this. Think about
it. GATA spent a lot of money on legal fees attempting to get the Fed
to publicly disclose its records related to the Fed’s gold
activities. The Fed spent even more money denying GATA’s quest. And
how come the Fed won’t submit to a public, independent audit of its
gold vaults?
This
brings me to the issue of the Ukraine’s gold. According to public
records, the Government of Ukraine owns 33 tonnes of gold that was
being safekept in Ukraine. Last week a Ukrainian newspaper reported
that acting PM Arseny Yatsenyuk ordered the transfer of that gold to
the United States. The actual report is here: LINK. Jesse’s Cafe
Americain provided a translated version here: LINK.
On the assumption that the report is true, and so far I have not seen any
commentary or articles suggesting it is not true, the biggest
question is, how come the U.S. has absolutely no problem loading up
and transporting 33 tonnes of gold from Ukraine to the U.S. but seems
to have difficulty loading up and transporting any of Germany’s
gold from New York to Berlin? And how come the U.S. and Ukraine seem
to care about that gold at all, if indeed gold is irrelevant? It
would seem that it would be a lot less expensive and logistically
complicated just to have the U.S. military post a few armed guards
around the gold if they’re worried about theft. On the other hand,
I’m sure Putin would be happy to buy the gold from Ukraine.
What
makes the story even more interesting is that GATA’s Chris Powell
has spent considerable time trying to get an answer to the question
of whether or not the U.S. has taken custody of Ukraine’s gold.
When he queried the NY Fed, they responded with:
“A
spokesman for the New York Fed said simply: “Any inquiry regarding
gold accounts should be directed to the account holder. You may want
to contact the National Bank of Ukraine to discuss this report”
(LINK).
After
trying for two days to get an answer from the U.S. State Department,
they finally responded by referring him to the NY Fed (LINK).
The
final piece in verifying that the report is true is deflection from
Ukraine. Mr. Powell has queried the National Bank of Ukraine, the
Ukrainian Embassy in DC, and the Ukrainian mission to the UN in NYC.
Crickets. As Chris states the case:
“The
difficulty in getting a straight answer here is pretty good evidence
that the Ukrainian gold indeed has been sent to the United States.”
Unfortunately,
it is likely that the citizens of Ukraine will end up paying the same
price for allowing the U.S. to “safekeep” their sovereign gold.
That price is the comforting knowledge that their gold has been
delivered safely to vaults in China under U.S./UK bullion bank
contractual delivery obligations, where it will be locked away for
centuries.
All
this skullduggery over a barbarous relic that has been deemed
irrelevant by the U.S. Federal Reserve…
