ONE OF MANY HEADS ON THE UR'S PIKES:

A sanctioned friend of Vladimir Putin, the businessman Arkady Rotenberg, has frozen construction on the Kerch channel bridge, due to a lack of financing. Forbes Russia reports the contracting company, Rotenberg's Stroygazmontazh, did not receive a scheduled money transfer from the budget and doesn't have the capital to continue constructing the bridge that would connect annexed Crimea to its new homeland's terra firma. [...]

A story has been circling around Moscow for some time, sourced to people inside the Kremlin: After the sanctions were announced, Vladimir Putin is said to have met with his businessman friends and promised them that he would compensate them for losses incurred from Western sanctions.

Russia's President has been doing his best to help his friends out, but the source of funding that has allowed him to do so might be drying up soon. RBC asked a number of Russian economists how soon Russia's Reserve fund would be exhausted. 14 out of 32 economists assume it might happen as soon as 2017. They conclude that if oil prices keep at around $40-50 per barrel, by the beginning of next year there will be no more than 1.1 trillion rubles ($16.6 billion) in the Fund. And if oil prices don't come back to over $50, by the end of next year, Russia's Reserve Fund might be emptied completely.

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