Crypto News: Putin’s second front

Energy shortfalls were always part of the equation in the response to Russia's invasion of Ukraine. But few were prepared for gas becoming a second front in President Vladimir Putin's wider conflict with the US and its allies.

In less than five months of war, Moscow has retaliated against successive waves of international sanctions by tightening its supplies of natural gas to Europe. That's contributed to a spike in prices, stoking inflation that's hitting consumers and governments from the UK to Bulgaria.

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It's also triggered a free-for-all as Europe competes on the global stage to secure alternatives to Russian gas. With no time to build pipelines, countries from the Americas to the Middle East and Africa are being courted for shipments of liquefied natural gas.

But there isn't enough to go around. The result is that gas now rivals oil as the driver of geopolitics.

Plans to tackle climate change are falling victim as a result, even as a record drought in Italy highlights the costs of inaction.

A tighter squeeze is still to come.

At the outbreak of the war, Germany put on ice the Nord Stream 2 pipeline that was due to start gas flows from Russia. Now, the first Nord Stream is about to undergo maintenance and Berlin is warning that Moscow may not bring it back online, risking the collapse of industries as Putin blackmails Europe's largest economy.

Chancellor Olaf Scholz's government, already in talks with gas giant Uniper over a possible bailout of as much as 9 billion euros, is preparing legislation that would enable the state to take stakes in further struggling energy companies.

Ukraine is suffering the frontal assault in this war. The rest of Europe, in aligning with Kyiv against Moscow, is straining with the repercussions too. — Alan Crawford

Storage tanks at the Leuna refinery and chemical industrial complex in Germany, on June 7. Photographer: Krisztian Bocsi/Bloomberg

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What we know | From then-President Donald Trump demanding to join the mob attacking the US Capitol to even his daughter doubting his claims of election fraud, the revelations from the House committee investigating the Jan. 6, 2021 insurrection have become must-see television. Billy House takes a look at the most notable moments in the six sessions so far.

President Joe Biden pledged to continue fighting the "epidemic of gun violence" after a mass shooting at an Independence Day parade in a suburb of Chicago.

Trade talks | Senior US and Chinese officials discussed American economic sanctions and tariffs today amid reports the Biden administration is close to rolling back some of the trade levies imposed by Trump. China said Vice Premier Liu He and Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen discussed stabilizing global supply chains, while the US said Yellen raised the issue of Russia's war against Ukraine and "unfair" economic practices from Beijing.

China's elderly are an exception to the one consistent silver lining to Covid-19 outbreaks. While more cases usually trigger a surge in vaccinations, the number of fully immunized people in Shanghai aged 60 or above increased just one percentage point after a two-month lockdown ended in mid-June, despite hundreds of deaths.

Spending support | Ukraine has indicated it needs $60 billion-$65 billion this year to meet its funding requirements including emergency budget assistance and logistics infrastructure projects, billions more than its allies have so far pledged. The figure, which excludes defense and security spending, is part of a larger blueprint for reconstruction that's estimated to exceed $750 billion over the next decade.

Employees killed and displaced, infrastructure seized by force and relentless cyberattacks are only a few of the wartime challenges facing Kyivstar, Ukraine's largest mobile phone operator.

Piling up | UK Prime Minister Boris Johnson is facing another scandal after a former Foreign Office chief civil servant wrote a letter contradicting Downing Street's defense that the premier was unaware of complaints against a Conservative MP before he appointed him to the government. Christopher Pincher resigned last week as deputy chief whip, one of Johnson's political enforcers, in the wake of newspaper allegations he groped two fellow guests at a private club.

Rising doubts | After a year of debate and wrangling, Chile's Constitutional Convention presented its final version of the charter to President Gabriel Boric, marking a shift away from the current document implemented under the 1973-1990 military dictatorship. As Eduardo Thomson explains, with a referendum set for Sept. 4, polls suggests voters are starting to question the broad changes it would enact on everything from social rights to political rules.

Bloomberg TV and Radio air Balance of Power with David Westin weekdays from 12 to 1 p.m. ET, with a second hour on Bloomberg Radio from 1 to 2 p.m. ET. You can watch and listen on Bloomberg channels and online here or check out prior episodes and guest clips here.

China's Communist Party wrapped up its final regional congresses last week, paving the way for a national gathering in the fall that's expected to hand President Xi Jinping a precedent-defying third term.
Argentina's new Economy Minister Silvina Batakis vowed to continue the government's economic plans, in a bid to stem a market plunge following a weekend filled with political turmoil.
Italy declared a state of emergency in five northern and central regions hit by the drought as a severe heat wave takes its toll on agriculture and threatens power supplies.
Sri Lanka, which has run out of dollars to purchase fuel and is printing rupees to pay local salaries, aims to stop injecting local currency into the economy to quash Asia's fastest inflation estimated to touch 60%.
French President Emmanuel Macron's success in using public spending to tame rampant inflation is reaching its limits as a swelling debt burden and the loss of a governing majority curtails his ability to act.

And finally ... WNBA star Brittney Griner, who's on trial in Moscow, wrote to Biden pleading with him to bring her and other Americans detained in Russia back home. The two-time Olympic gold medalist faces up to 10 years in prison if convicted of drug smuggling after police accused her in February of illegally importing hash oil into Russia in vape cartridges. Griner told Biden she is "terrified I might be here forever," the Associated Press reported.