Russia: It ain’t necessarily so

Russia has spent $112bn of hard currency reserves since early August to defend the rouble and rescue banks and companies. The Bank of Russia - the central bank - has used its reserves to cushion the blow. Reserves depletion accelerated in late October. But it probably would be wrong to conclude that Russia is running out of cash. Simple maths could support a bearish scenario: Russia has only about four months of foreign currency reserves left if the Bank of Russia keeps spending $31bn a week, as...