How Russia rescued the ruble

Russia said last week that it wants the European countries that buy its natural gas to make their payments in Rubles, rather than dollars or euros. A month ago, that might have seemed like a pretty good deal: The ruble was down 40%, at 139 rubles to the dollar, in the wake of Russia's invasion of Ukraine.

Since that low point on March 7, however, the Russian ruble has staged a dramatic recovery. At the time of this writing, it was trading at 84 to the dollar, which is right back where it was at the time of the invasion. And this is no dead cat bounce. It's a sharp and sustained recovery that made the ruble the world's top-performing currency in March, reports National Public Radio of the USA.

Yet all the sanctions imposed when the war began are still in place, and in some cases they're even more robust. So how have the Russians managed to revive their currency?

The holes in the sanctions wall

This recovery has several components. The first is thanks to the enormous hole in the sanctions that were imposed by the coalition of countries allied with the U.S.: natural gas. The sanctions are designed to restrict Russia's ability to acquire foreign currency — dollars and euros in particular. But several European countries continue to buy Russian gas because they have become so dependent on it and because there are not enough alternative suppliers to meet demand.