The rouble is plunging, to lows last seen immediately after the invasion of Ukraine began. Inflation (and the data are almost certainly massaged down) is rising.
The wheels are coming off in Russia. Putin is waiting desperately for Trump to take office and prevent Ukraine from continuing its struggle for freedom. Because if he doesn't, Putin is finished. Russia is running out of resources to fight the war.
The chart below shows my calculation of inflation for the 'Big 8' economies compared with the percentage of world economies where inflation exceeds 6%. Calculating meaningful average inflation indices for the world is tricky because some countries go through periods of very high inflation or even hyperinflation. Russia after the fall of the Soviet Union, and Brazil before it had its currency reform, are good examples. I have excluded them from the calculation of the Big 8 CPI during these periods, i.e, Russia before 2000 and Brazil before 1996.
However, they have not been excluded from the percentage of countries with inflation above 6%, since they will not distort these results.
Most countries have rising inflation, which means that most countries will be tightening monetary and fiscal policy. Which in turn means that at some point most countries will experience at least a growth slowdown, and more probably a recession.
