Georgia Ports has secured federal approval for a $2.3 billion container terminal that will add 3.5 million TEUs of capacity at the Port of Savannah.

President Donald Trump says he has struck a deal with Russian President Vladimir Putin to import large amounts of diesel fuel into the United States—apparently hoping to lower fuel prices in the weeks before the midterm elections.

The exact terms of that agreement remain somewhat unclear. The White House has not said when the purchases will be made, what prices will be paid, or who will be paying (private companies or taxpayers), though the Treasury announced that it would be issuing a "temporary general license to allow the supply of Russian diesel to the global market." Reporting by The New York Times suggests that investors with ties to the administration are most likely to profit. Because diesel prices are determined by a global market, it's also far from certain that the Russian gas would make much of a dent in American prices.

However, this much is clear: If Trump follows through with this "deal," he will have violated two federal laws recently passed by Congress—one of which he signed just weeks ago.

The more significant of those two laws is the Ending Importation of Russian Oil Act, which passed the House with a 413–9 vote and was unanimously approved by the Senate. President Joe Biden signed that bill into law on April 8, 2022. The law is an outright ban on Russian energy products, including diesel fuel.

The law also lays out the process for lifting the ban on imports. The president must tell Congress that Russia has "reached an agreement to withdraw Russian forces and cease military hostilities in Ukraine" and has recognized "the right of the Ukrainian people to independently and freely choose their own government."

There is also a clear timeline for lifting the ban. Any termination of the ban requires a 90-day waiting period, during which time Congress has the opportunity to block the change.

Obviously, Russia has not withdrawn from Ukraine. Even if it had, the White House has not gone through the necessary process to notify Congress, nor waited the necessary 90 days.

The law does not allow a president to ignore it if fuel prices are high and an election is approaching. It does not allow a president to ignore it if he starts an illegal war in another part of the world that causes fuel prices to spike.

Trump's attempt to disregard that law has drawn a bipartisan rebuke from members of Congress. A group of seven senators—three Democrats and four Republicans—issued a joint statement this week saying that Trump's deal "runs directly counter to" the 2022 law.

Sen. Thom Tillis (R–N.C.), one of the senators who joined that statement, said on Sunday that there is "a legitimate case for saying the president's not following the law."

The second law at play is the Lindsey O. Graham Sanctioning Russia and Iran Act, named for the late senator and passed earlier this year. Among other things, it authorizes the president to levy tariffs of up to 100 percent against countries that buy Russian crude oil and natural gas. The intent is clear: to prevent Russia from being able to finance its war against Ukraine by selling energy commodities onto the global market. Trump signed it into law last month.

Lawmakers on both sides of the aisle have also pointed to that law in the days since Trump announced his deal to buy Russian diesel.

"Now is the time to use those sanctions to squeeze Putin's war machine, not reward a dictator by putting more money in his hands while he continues targeting and killing Ukrainian civilians," Rep. Don Bacon (R–Neb.) posted on X this week. Rep. Steny Hoyer (D–Md.) said it was "outrageous" for Trump to be buying energy from Russia after signing a bill that could be used to punish other countries for doing the same.

The White House could argue that, in this case, Trump is merely violating the spirit of the law rather than the letter of it. Even so, this is blatantly hypocritical.

The hypocrisy runs deep. The Trump administration has spent much of its second term trying to restrict trade and downplay the advice of economists who have warned that doing so would raise prices. Now, Trump is once again seeking imports as a means to ease high prices—as he has done with beef and other products. Perhaps the White House should apply this general principle more broadly, and in circumstances where doing so would not violate federal laws.

Some of the president's allies are now trying to downplay these violations of federal law. Conservative pundit Mollie Hemingway says Trump is merely trying to "put the American people first" by addressing rising gas prices.

Sorry, but no. The president is not allowed to disregard federal laws because he believes it will lower gas prices in swing states.

You can, of course, criticize those laws for being misguided. Trade is generally good, and erecting barriers to the flow of goods tends to be costly. Trump could ask Congress to repeal these laws. He cannot deliberately ignore them.

If the "deal" with Russia comes to fruition, it will further erode what little power Congress retains within America's democratic system. If a president is not bound by the laws Congress has passed, then the legislature might as well not exist at all.

The post Trump's Plan To Buy Russian Diesel Would Violate Federal Law appeared first on Reason Magazine.

Expected global revenue of over $1 billion and new faces at the U17 World Cup show women's football is booming, but a recent report also highlights need for better structures globally.

The Port of Los Angeles handled a record 1,042,652 twenty-foot equivalent units (TEUs) in September, marking the busiest month in its 118-year history as strong consumer demand and shifting global...

President Donald Trump’s deal for Russian diesel exposed the US to legal questions, opened a rift with his Republican allies and European leaders and heightened tensions with Ukraine — all in exchange for an outcome that experts suggest is unlikely to succeed.

The last time Formula 1 hosted a race in Africa was way back in 1993. But a new track in Rwanda is set to host a Grand Prix in "the early 2030s," continuing the country’s investment in international sport.

A drone strike on 10 October put more than half of the large fuel tanks out of action at an oil-loading terminal in Russia’s Rostov-on-Don, Russian news Telegram channel Astra found. The terminal loads fuel onto river and sea tankers for export, and it burned for two days while a local channel wrote that reeds might be on fire. Neither Kyiv nor Moscow has officially acknowledged the hit. It came hours after US President Donald Trump announced a diesel deal with Russian leader Vladimir Putin.

Russia has spent the autumn hammering Ukraine’s power grid ahead of winter. Ukraine’s long-range drones keep hitting the refineries, depots, and terminals that fuel Russia’s army and earn it export revenue. Every burned tank turns that revenue into repair bills, while Moscow is already subsidizing its own fuel pumps. A refinery-only truce of the kind the White House described a day after the strike would shield the Russian plants that feed terminals like this one.

Seven of 12 tanks out of action

Astra’s analysts concluded from eyewitness footage that at least seven of the terminal’s 12 large tanks had been knocked out. Ukrainian monitoring channel Supernova+ counted seven burned-out tanks and one more scorched by the fire.

The fire was still burning in the early hours of 12 October. Local channel Rostov Glavny posted video of the burning tank farm, passing on rumors that reeds were on fire and noting the city’s second day under smoke, The Moscow Times reported. Footage filmed in the daytime on 12 October showed no more open flames, only gray smoke, according to Astra.

A terminal that loads fuel for export

The site is the oil-loading terminal of the Novoshakhtinsk Oil Products Plant, formerly known as Yug Rusi, in Rostov-on-Don’s Zheleznodorozhny District. It receives, stores, and transships fuel onto river and sea tankers, including for export, Ukrainian monitoring channel Exilenova+ said.

The terminal also supplies fuel to the Russian army and earns Moscow hard currency, ZN reported. The Moscow Times put its loading capacity at 3.5 million tons a year and its tank farm at about 60,000 cubic meters, roughly 16 million gallons.

The refinery itself stands in the town of Novoshakhtinsk near the border with Russian-occupied Luhansk Oblast. The terminal sits on the Don River with access to the Sea of Azov, Ukrainian military outlet Militarnyi noted. Ukraine hit the refinery in June, and Ukraine’s General Staff reported striking the Yug Rusi terminal on 9 July, placing it in Bataysk.

A night of drones over the region

Exilenova+ posted images of the burning terminal in the early hours of 10 October. It presented them as the site after Trump’s phone call with Putin. The channel later shared NASA satellite fire data showing the blaze.

Rostov Oblast Governor Yuri Slyusar claimed the attack injured six people. Slyusar further stated air defenses downed more than 100 drones over the region. Radio Liberty’s Russian Service noted that neither side had officially confirmed the hit on the terminal.

Hours after the US-Russia diesel deal

The strike came hours after Trump announced on 9 October that Russia had agreed to supply diesel to US and global markets. The US Treasury then cleared the trade with a sanctions license.

On 11 October, Trump declared an “energy ceasefire” between Russia and Ukraine. Under it, he expects Ukraine to stop striking Russian refineries, a White House official told Axios.

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy said that evening that Ukraine’s armed forces had received all relevant orders. Neither Ukrainian monitoring channels nor Russian officials have reported a new strike on a Russian oil facility since. On 13 October, Zelenskyy said Ukraine was ready to guarantee an energy ceasefire if Russia took matching steps.

Ukrainian drones have helped push Russia into its worst fuel crisis since the Soviet Union fell, The Washington Post (WaPo) reported on 11 October.

Diesel is where this war reaches American drivers. US President Donald Trump blames rising diesel prices mostly on Russia’s war in Ukraine, while experts blame mainly the US war with Iran. Some of his allies now accuse Kyiv of trying to sway the US midterms.

Drones go for the first stage of refining

The Washington Post looked at dozens of strikes between 1 April and 31 August. Three refinery experts then examined satellite images of 54 strikes with visible damage. In over half, the damage seems to be to the desalting and distillation units, known by the Russian acronym ELOU-AVT. These units clean the crude of water and salt, then split it into separate compounds, the first steps toward gasoline and diesel. More than a third appear to have hit secondary units, which turn those compounds into jet fuel, gasoline, and liquefied petroleum gas.

From April through August, drones struck two-thirds or more of the 36 big Russian refineries that S&P Global Energy tracks, a strike every third day. Some took as many as five hits. On 16 June, drones set the Moscow refinery’s distillation towers on fire. That strike and a second one days later kept the plant offline into September, WaPo reported, citing data firm Kpler. Ukraine targeted the refinery again on 20 September.

“We don’t need to hit the entire plant,” a Ukrainian drone battalion commander with the call sign Tango told The Washington Post. Ukraine knows where to strike so that a refinery stops and stays down, he said. His unit, Ukraine’s 1st Separate Center of Unmanned Systems, runs long-range strikes deep inside Russia.

Sanctions slow the repairs

The EU banned exports of oil-refining equipment to Russia the day after the 2022 invasion, and the US followed days later. WaPo reported that the bans cover the distillation and secondary processing units Ukraine keeps hitting. The bans make spare parts hard to get, Alexander Kolyandr of Eurasia Group told the paper, and the strikes come faster than repairs.

Since last year, Ukraine has doubled the size of each wave, decoys included, a person involved in the strike campaign told WaPo. The decoys are unarmed and draw Russian fire, wasting air-defense ammunition, WaPo explained. Without them, the person said, Ukraine would simply lose expensive systems. András Rácz of the German Council on Foreign Relations told WaPo that even if only 2–3% of drones get through, the damage is significant.

Dense heavy crude, which oil refiners around the world favor for its typically low cost, is piling up in the Americas as soaring freight rates have stifled exports and US refiners have been running close to their limits. 

Germany's win against Australia saw Ena Mahmutovic excel in goal. The 22-year-old Bayern Munich goalkeeper is considered the successor to Ann-Katrin Berger and is making a name for herself.

By Jan Wolfe Oct 11 (Reuters) – Republican US Senator Thom Tillis on Sunday said President Donald Trump’s diesel supply deal with Russia may be illegal and will put American lives at risk, adding to bipartisan...

Ukrainian forces have attacked one of Russia’s most important oil transport and blending facilities for the third time this month. The Samara hub handles crude from several major producing regions and plays a central role in preparing Russia’s Urals export blend, making it a target of considerably greater strategic significance than an ordinary oil depot.

Ukraine has intensified its campaign against Russia’s oil industry with another drone strike on the Samara linear production and dispatch station, a major facility in the pipeline network operated by state-controlled Transneft. The latest attack, during the night of 9–10 October, followed earlier strikes on 2 and 7 October, which Ukrainian military authorities say caused extensive damage to storage tanks and associated infrastructure.

The significance of Samara extends well beyond the destruction of stored oil. Situated near the settlement of Prosvet in Russia’s Samara region, the installation is a junction where crude oil arriving from Western Siberia, Tatarstan and the Volga-Urals producing regions is received, stored, blended and redistributed. Its role makes it an important link between Russian oil production, domestic refining and export markets.

According to the Ukrainian General Staff’s operational report, Samara is responsible for blending crude with different sulphur contents to produce Urals, Russia’s principal export grade. Ukraine’s military says the facility also contributes to supplying the Russian armed forces.

Why Samara matters to Russia’s oil exports

Unlike an oil refinery, where crude is processed into petrol, diesel and other fuels, the Samara installation performs a function earlier in the supply chain. It is one of the points where different grades of Russian crude are brought together to produce a commercially standardised export mixture.

Western Siberian crude generally has different characteristics from oil extracted in the Volga-Urals basin, including variations in sulphur content and density. Blending these streams is essential to maintaining the specifications of Urals crude, which is supplied to refineries and sold on international markets.

Samara’s importance also reflects the sheer scale of the infrastructure concentrated at the site. Ukrainian Special Operations Forces describe a facility where four major oil pipelines converge, supported by 71 storage tanks with a combined capacity exceeding 1.6 million cubic metres.

The site’s central role is not simply a Ukrainian assessment. Transneft-Privoĺga’s management previously described the Samara installation as having Europe’s largest oil storage tank farm and identified its blending station and associated pumping installations as part of a major modernisation programme.

Approximately 140 million tonnes of oil passes through the Samara complex annually. That figure would make the installation an important concentration point within the wider Russian pipeline system.

The consequences of sustained disruption could therefore extend beyond the immediate loss of storage capacity. Damage to blending operations, connecting pipelines or loading equipment could interfere with the movement of crude towards refineries and export routes. The precise effect would depend on the functioning of alternative facilities, available spare capacity and the speed of repairs.

Three attacks in nine days

The first strike, on 2 October, reportedly damaged 11 storage tanks with capacities of 20,000 cubic metres each, three larger tanks of 50,000 cubic metres, sections of pipeline and an automated loading station. The Security Service of Ukraine confirmed that its personnel had participated in the operation alongside other branches of the armed forces.

A further strike on 7 October destroyed four large storage tanks and caused a substantial fire, according to Ukraine’s General Staff. Ukrainian Special Operations Forces subsequently confirmed another attack on 10 October, although the damage from that operation remains under assessment. The reported destruction and damage have not been independently verified in full.

The repeated attacks indicate an effort to produce cumulative disruption rather than rely on a single operation to disable an extensive industrial complex.

This approach is consistent with Ukraine’s broader campaign against Russia’s refining industry. As EU Today examined in August, repeated strikes on processing facilities can create difficulties that extend beyond the immediate damage, particularly when specialist equipment requires lengthy repairs.

From refinery attacks to the wider oil network

The campaign against Samara represents a significant extension of that strategy. Refineries remain important targets because they produce the fuels required by Russia’s armed forces and domestic economy. Transport and blending facilities, however, determine whether crude reaches those refineries in the required quantities and specifications.

Continuous attacks are essential because much of the damage inflicted by drones is repairable. Individual installations may return to service within days or weeks, meaning the cumulative effect depends heavily on whether further disruption occurs before repairs and production have fully resumed.

Russia’s refining industry remains heavily dependent on specialist equipment and technologies historically supplied by Western manufacturers. Sanctions have restricted access to replacement components, while domestically manufactured equipment and Chinese alternatives are not always technically compatible with existing installations. These constraints complicate repairs, prolong shutdowns and limit Russia’s ability to restore damaged refining capacity.

Samara presents a somewhat different vulnerability. Its importance rests on the concentration of pipeline connections, storage and blending operations at one location. A sustained interruption could affect several parts of the oil supply chain simultaneously, although the available evidence does not yet establish that the wider network has suffered a prolonged shutdown.

Ukraine has already demonstrated its willingness to strike other logistical installations. A recent attack on the Volodarskaya petroleum-products station near Moscow targeted another important part of Russia’s fuel distribution system.

Implications for Russia’s war economy

Oil remains central to Russia’s export earnings and federal finances, while the availability of refined petroleum products influences military logistics, transport and industrial activity.

The immediate economic significance of the Samara attacks will depend on how much operational capacity has been lost, whether crude can be redirected through alternative infrastructure and how quickly Transneft can restore the damaged facilities.

There is an important distinction between destroying storage tanks and preventing oil from moving through a network. The former reduces available capacity; the latter can impose broader restrictions on production, refining and exports. Establishing the extent to which the latest strikes have achieved either effect will require further operational evidence.

Nevertheless, the decision to return repeatedly to Samara illustrates a development in Ukraine’s campaign against Russia’s energy sector. Rather than concentrating exclusively on the refineries that convert crude into fuel, Kyiv is also attacking infrastructure that connects oil production to its commercial and military end users.

For Moscow, the vulnerability of Samara is particularly consequential because the installation occupies a central position in the movement and preparation of Urals crude. Any sustained loss of its blending, storage or distribution functions would introduce additional pressure into an oil system already facing repeated attacks on its refineries and export infrastructure.

The latest operation therefore raises a question extending beyond the damage to one industrial site: whether Russia can maintain reliable oil flows when several interconnected stages of its energy supply chain are subjected to recurring disruption.

Ukraine, which long kept its weapons at home, is now clearing its arms makers to sell abroad. Its Commission on Export Control has granted 18 Ukrainian companies permission to send their finished weapons abroad and has processed more than 400 export applications, with over 90% approved, the National Security and Defense Council says, citing commission head Davyd Aloian.

Ukraine now produces far more weapons than it can afford, with defense production growing from about $1 billion a year at the start of the invasion to a projected $55 billion in 2026.

The exports are reportedly conducted under the Drone Deals framework that President Volodymyr Zelenskyy unveiled in April, which allows controlled sales of surplus weapons to partner countries while the Defense Ministry and General Staff retain first claim to everything the front needs. Some categories already run up to 50% beyond what Ukraine can use or finance.

From a stalled commission to 18 approvals

The commission’s work had been halting. It resumed in February after an eight-month freeze and issued the first permits then, and its updated membership has been working since, Aloian notes.

Building partnerships abroad

Aloian framed the goal as scaling Ukrainian technology rather than one-off deals. The state wants domestic producers to expand abroad while partners get working solutions, he says, and is open to dialogue with the defense industry to fix problems as they arise.

Earlier, an industry group that represents more than 400 companies warned in September that the mechanism was choking. A new 20-to-30% fee on export permits priced Ukrainian goods out of the market, it said, and a joint-production program had stalled with hundreds of foreign bids pending.

Euromaidan Press cannot verify whether the Commission on Export Control has taken the issue into consideration.

The council recently met a UK Defense Ministry delegation to discuss closer cooperation, including a Drone Deal, an anti-ballistic coalition, and joint production, Aloian adds. Reaching foreign markets enables producers to attract new orders and investment, scale up, and build long-term partnerships.

THE gloves are off, the engines are roaring and Germany is bracing itself for a motorsport showdown of epic proportions! Forget the calculators. Forget the cautious driving. And forget playing it safe. The 2026 DTM championship reaches its explosive conclusion at Hockenheim this weekend, with SIX drivers still dreaming of lifting one of European motorsport’s most coveted trophies.

And the man with the biggest target on his back is Porsche superstar Thomas Preining.

The Austrian arrives at the legendary Hockenheimring with a commanding 23-point advantage over his nearest challenger.

But with 56 points still available across the final weekend, the champagne will have to stay firmly on ice.

PREINING IN POLE POSITION — BUT RIVALS ARE CIRCLING

Preining, already a DTM champion, knows exactly what it takes to survive the pressure of a title fight. Driving for Manthey, the Porsche ace has put himself in the driving seat for a second championship crown.

But Mercedes-AMG star Maro Engel is breathing down his neck, and BMW veteran Marco Wittmann, a two-time champion, is lurking dangerously in the background. Both have the experience, machinery and determination to turn Preining’s dream weekend into an absolute nightmare.

Then come the outsiders. Mercedes driver Lucas Auer, Ferrari racer Matteo Cairoli and Aston Martin’s Nicki Thiim all retain mathematical chances of snatching the championship.

For those three, however, it would take something approaching a motorsport miracle. They need brilliant results — and some serious misfortune for the men ahead.

HOCKENHEIM: WHERE DREAMS COME TRUE — OR DIE

There could hardly be a more fitting battlefield.

The Hockenheimring has hosted the DTM season finale more than 30 times, earning its reputation as the place where champions are crowned and reputations shattered.

Its 4.5-kilometre Grand Prix circuit demands precision, courage and nerves of steel.

Get your braking wrong and a rival can pounce. Make a mistake in traffic and an entire season’s hard work could disappear in seconds.

And nobody needs reminding what happened here last year.

Turkish racer Ayhancan Güven snatched the 2025 championship with a breathtaking late move against Wittmann at the Sachs-Kurve.

It was the sort of dramatic finish that makes motorsport irresistible.

Now Wittmann is back, determined to ensure history does not repeat itself at his expense.

GERMAN GIANTS PREPARE FOR BATTLE

The DTM is no ordinary racing championship. This is a contest in which some of the biggest names in the motor industry throw their engineering expertise into a furious battle for supremacy.

Porsche, Mercedes-AMG, BMW, Ferrari and Aston Martin are represented among the six title contenders, and with GT3 machinery producing spectacular performance, the racing promises to be fierce.

Unlike Formula One, where aerodynamic advantages can sometimes leave the field stretched out, DTM’s competitive format regularly produces close battles, aggressive overtaking and unpredictable finishes.

Track position is precious. Pit-stop execution matters enormously. And a poorly timed safety car can transform the championship picture.

One moment a driver can be heading towards glory, the next, he can be staring at disaster.

TWO RACES. ONE CHAMPION.

Saturday’s race begins at 1.30pm local time, with Sunday’s championship decider scheduled for 4.30pm.

That leaves precious little room for error.

For Preining, the equation is straightforward: protect the advantage without becoming so defensive that his challengers seize the initiative.

For Engel and Wittmann, the message is equally clear. Attack.

They cannot afford to sit behind the Porsche and hope for the best.

And should Saturday’s race produce a major surprise, Sunday’s finale could become an extraordinary winner-takes-all spectacle.

MORE THAN JUST A RACE

Away from the championship battle, Hockenheim is preparing a full-blown motorsport festival.

The supporting programme includes the ADAC GT Masters, Porsche Carrera Cup Germany, ADAC GT4 Germany and BMW M2 Cup. Fans can also enjoy pit-lane walks, driver appearances and live entertainment.

But the biggest attraction remains the battle on the circuit. Six drivers started the weekend with a mathematical chance of becoming champion. Only one can leave with the crown.

When the chequered flag falls on Sunday evening, there could be tears, triumph — and the sort of last-lap drama that makes the DTM one of Europe’s great racing spectacles.

Main Image: By Steffen Prößdorf, CC BY-SA 4.0, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=195366194

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President Donald Trump said Friday that Russia has agreed to release millions of tons of diesel fuel into U.S. and global markets following a telephone call with Russian President Vladimir...

The Port of Los Angeles reported its best single month in its history. In a media briefing, port executive director Gene Seroka announced the port processed 1,042,652 TEUs, 23k TEUs more than the July 2025 record.

Russia's seaborne exports of refined oil products rose to a three-month high in September, but the growth came from cheaper fuel oil and naphtha as diesel shipments fell to their lowest in more than a decade, Bloomberg reported, citing Vortexa data. Russia kept diesel at home after Ukrainian refinery strikes and paid oil companies to supply its pumps, while high crude prices lifted its crude export earnings.

During the ongoing deep-strike campaign, Ukraine's long-range drones have knocked out more than half of Russia's oil refining capacity, Kyiv says, and Russia's budget oil revenues are falling even as it raises war spending. High global crude prices are softening that blow.

Cheaper fuel out

Total seaborne product exports reached about 1.17 million barrels a day in September. Fuel oil shipments rose 6% to about 613,000 barrels a day, the highest since April. Naphtha, a feedstock for petrochemicals, jumped 35% to 363,000 barrels a day. Exports of refinery feedstocks, including vacuum gasoil, rose to about 32,000 barrels a day, according to Bloomberg.

The trade has moved north. Almost 80% of fuel oil cargoes left from Baltic ports, and naphtha loadings there rose almost 50% as Ukrainian attacks disrupted Black Sea infrastructure. In September, Ukraine reported hitting an oil terminal in Novorossiysk, Russia's main Black Sea oil port—one in a string of attacks on Russia's Black Sea ports and oil sites.

Diesel kept at home

Diesel and gasoil exports fell 28% to 144,000 barrels a day, the lowest monthly volume in Vortexa data going back more than a decade. Russia has restricted diesel exports to protect domestic supply after Ukrainian attacks on its refineries. Drones kept hitting them into October, from a Lukoil refinery in Volgograd to Gazprom's Salavat complex in Bashkortostan.

In September, Russia paid oil companies the biggest subsidy in more than four years to keep road fuel on the domestic market. It also imported about 350,000 tonnes of motor fuel by sea, mostly gasoline from India, Morocco, and Türkiye, Reuters calculations showed. Officials are considering letting some producers resume diesel exports in October to avoid overstocking, according to Interfax.

The diesel squeeze has reached the White House. US President Donald Trump stated on 30 September that diesel was hurt "not by the Middle East, but by what's going on in Russia, because those diesel refineries are being knocked out at a pretty alarming rate."

Crude carries the revenue

Russia's crude exports reached about 3.99 million barrels a day in the week to 27 September, and the estimated value of its seaborne crude shipments neared its highest since the full-scale invasion began, Bloomberg reported. Brent crude traded at about $102.60 a barrel on 9 October, according to Trading Economics data.

U.S. container imports are finally beginning to slow after an unusually long peak shipping season that stretched through the summer and into early fall, according to the latest Global Port Tracker report from the National Retail Federation (NRF) and Hackett Associates. The slowdown comes after months of stronger-than-expected cargo volumes at major U.S. ports, as retailers continued bringing in merchandise despite tariffs, inflation and higher transportation costs. Ports covered by Global Port Tracker handled 2.3 million twenty-foot equivalent units (TEUs) in August, up 0.4% from July but down 0.7% from a year earlier. August now appears to have been the busiest month of 2026, marking a shift from last month’s forecast that September would take the top spot. “Even with any fluctuations in final data, we’re likely past the busiest part of the year,” said Jonathan Gold, NRF vice president for supply chain and customs policy. “The truth is that the peak season started early and was stretched out through the summer and early fall, with the difference from month to month often amounting to little more than a rounding error,” Gold said. The latest forecast puts September imports at 2.28 million TEUs, down from the 2.31 million TEUs projected a month ago. October is expected to ease further to 2.25 million TEUs before volumes fall to 2 million TEUs in November. Despite the expected slowdown, imports are still running well ahead of last year in some months. September volumes are forecast to rise 8.2% year over year, followed by an 8.5% increase in October. The revised outlook follows a peak season that has repeatedly defied expectations. Retailers moved merchandise into the country earlier this year to get ahead of tariff changes and supply chain uncertainty, initially raising expectations that imports would peak early and decline through the summer. Instead, volumes remained elevated, with shipping delays and resilient consumer demand helping extend the traditional peak season. The strength has been evident at individual ports. The Port of Los Angeles recorded its busiest three-month stretch on record during June, July and August, while the Port of Savannah reported a record September earlier this week, handling 504,015 TEUs, up 3.7% from a year earlier. Hackett Associates founder Ben Hackett said the economic outlook remains mixed, with consumers continuing to spend despite signs of weakening confidence. “Despite this, consumers appear to remain confident and cautious at the same time, with consumer confidence indexes sliding to multi-year lows while consumer spending continues to be robust in the face of increasing inflation,” Hackett said. For the full year, Global Port Tracker now expects imports at major U.S. container ports to reach 25.8 million TEUs, up 1.4% from 25.4 million TEUs in 2025. That is slightly above last month’s forecast of 25.7 million TEUs. Looking ahead, January 2027 imports are forecast at 2.07 million TEUs, down 1.9% year over year, followed by 1.92 million TEUs in February, up 1%. For retailers, the extended shipping season means much of the merchandise needed for the holidays is already in the country, reducing the need for another major import surge before year-end. “Most holiday merchandise has arrived, and the remainder of the year is just a matter of last-minute replenishment and preparation for early 2027,” Gold said.

Since winning the right to hold the 2034 World Cup unopposed, Saudi Arabia has been pulling away from sport. With reports that its most ambitious stadium project will be abandoned, what does this mean for the World Cup?

More than 50 Russian companies could default on their bonds this year, the most since 2009, a rating-agency analyst told Russian newspaper Izvestia, which reported it on 6 October.

Russia's wartime economy is straining under high interest rates, and the budget is too: the 2026 deficit has nearly doubled from the earlier forecast to a record $88 billion, with more deficits planned for the next three years as Moscow raises taxes to fund the war and plans its biggest defense budget since the full-scale invasion began.

A default is a situation in which a company cannot make promised interest payments to investors on time or repay borrowed money. If a payment is not made by the agreed deadline, the company becomes delinquent, which under certain conditions is recognized as a default.

So far this year, 20 companies have defaulted for the first time, compared with 24 in all of 2025, said Mikhail Nikonov of the Expert RA rating agency. Most of the companies that missed payments are small issuers of high-yield bonds, Izvestia reported.

In 2026, Russian companies have missed payments totaling 41 billion rubles (about $490 million), compared with 34 billion rubles (about $410 million) the previous year, according to investment bank Sinara.

Russia faces a new wave of corporate defaults

By the end of 2026, the number of Russian companies unable to service their ruble-denominated debt on time could reach 40–50, the highest level since 2010, said Pavel Zholobov, junior managing director at the NRA rating agency.

The number of bond defaults in 2026 has already reached its highest level in a decade, Zholobov said. Similar figures were recorded in the mid-2010s: in 2014, 35 companies missed payments; in 2015, 52 did so; and in 2016, there were 44 issuers. This occurred in part after Western sanctions were imposed on Russia over its annexation of Crimea and its war in Donbas, as well as amid a halving of oil prices and a sharp weakening of the ruble.

There were more defaults only in 2009. At the time, amid the fallout from the global financial crisis, more than 100 issuers faced payment problems, while the volume of distressed debt reached nearly 200 billion rubles, Zholobov noted.

High interest rates put pressure on companies

This time, the main reason for companies' difficulties in making bond payments has been the prolonged period of high interest rates, which has continued since 2023. Companies are raising financing at high interest rates but are unable to refinance their debt on more favorable terms, explained Ekaterina Sidorova, head of the Foreign Exchange, Commodities and Debt Markets Department at SberCIB Investment Research.

At the same time, the situation does not yet resemble a systemic debt crisis: defaults are primarily being recorded among companies with low credit ratings and high debt burdens, Sidorova said.

If a company fails to repay bond debt, it is given 10 business days to meet its obligations. If it fails to do so, the company may offer investors a restructuring—for example, by postponing payments in exchange for a higher interest rate.

The number of defaults will remain high in 2027, Sidorova believes.

High interest rates were a response to accelerating inflation in Russia. Domestic demand was outpacing production, Russia's Central Bank said in October 2023. Sanctions over the war and rising defense spending had also hit the economy and the ruble, which had lost about 25% against the dollar that year. The bank raised its key rate from 7.5% in the first half of 2023 to 15% by the fall.

Ukraine targets Russia's oil industry to weaken its war economy

Ukraine is also seeking to weaken Russia's economy as part of efforts to reduce its ability to finance the war. In particular, Defense Minister Yevhenii Khmara said strikes on oil refineries are aimed at "bleeding the Russian war machine" and destroying its military and economic potential. According to the ministry, the attacks have knocked out more than 51% of Russia's oil refining capacity.

In the first half of July, Russian oil refineries processed about 3.9 million barrels of oil per day—the lowest level since March 2005. Due to the production cuts, Moscow was also forced to restrict fuel exports.