Melee
Equities fell sharply and bonds surged in the US as markets looked on in disbelief at the rapidly deteriorating situation in eastern Europe.
After drawing international condemnation for shelling a nuclear plant, Vladimir Putin signed laws permitting asset seizures and criminalizing domestic support for international sanctions against his regime. Russians calling for sanctions risk being imprisoned for up to three years. The publication of "fake news" about the Russian military is now illegal. I
In a move that might open the floodgates, assuming Russian energy remains in sanctioned, Shell became the first to buy Russian.
https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2022-03-04/shell-buys-russia-s-flagship-urals-oil-at-a-record-discount
The Taiwanese people must be terrified. Western and democratic countries should preemptively be offering a safe haven for those who are interested. The US should be incentivizing TSM to relocate.
The US has enticed TSMC and others to build fabs in tue US. As for getting TSMC to relocate out of Taiwan, that’s hardly in Taiwan’s interests, and there is a huge semiconductor ecosystem in Taiwan that will be very hard to replicate in the US, not least because those smaller companies don’t have the necessary margins.
I’d guess the US will ban importation of Russian oil within a week. Mostly a symbolic gesture, our imports of said oil are not large and, I think, mostly because they have certain grades of crude that are useful in refining.
Would be very good if the donation of aircraft to Ukraine could proceed. It seems to be stalled, to the West’s shame.
Right on, JYL. The central government has discouraged TSM and the others from building fabs outside of Taiwan. And, as you note, the Taiwanese arrogantly claim there are no good engineers outside of the island. (Can you name a single high-end logic chip designed there?)
It’s part of their “Silicon Shield” strategy.
Apple and AMD aided and abetted the strategy. The result is that US citizens are now expected to put their lives at risk to protect those companies from their own strategic mistake.
Emptynest. I beg to differ. IMHO, Taiwan are safer now. The West and other democracies have pulled together against an aggressive dictator and used all sorts of sanctions. China will think twice before committing to anything more than sabre-rattling