The Washington Post reports:
Russia may have to borrow money from international markets next year for the first time in a decade, Finance Minister Alexei Kudrin said Tuesday, as the government seeks to conserve cash amid a severe recession.
Russia last turned to foreign lenders in 2000. Since then, it had stashed windfall oil profits — helped by a surge in commodity prices — into a reserve fund and accumulated the third-largest foreign currency reserves in the world.
When oil prices were sky-high, Russia thought it could afford to invade neighboring Georgia. Now they’ve blown their wad and oil prices are back to normal, plus they’ve made themselves a pariah to foreign investors to boot. It couldn’t happen to a nicer tyrant.
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