Ukraine Launches Raid into Russian Territory

Ukraine is understood to have carried out its largest cross-border raid into Russian territory this week.

It is being reported that hundreds from Ukraine’s 22nd mechanised brigade (assisted with tanks, armour, and air defence systems) breached the border in Russia’s Kursk Oblast, in what is believed to be the most significant attack of its kind since the Kremlin’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine.

Officials in Kyiv have not commented on the reports, with neither civilian nor military leaders confirming or denying such claims.

In Russia, reports are circulating that Ukrainian troops have occupied 11 villages, across an area some ten miles deep and six miles wide. Such reports of course remain difficult to verify.

Within this area lies the Russian town of Sudzha – which is home to an important gas-transit point. It is here that all remaining gas flowing through Ukraine from Russia passes. Much of the gas that passes through this point eventually goes to other European markets.

Such developments have therefore seen TTF gas futures – the European benchmark – jump as much as 5.5, as traders factor in supply side fears.

Russian President Vladimir Putin is understood to have held emergency meetings.

Kenya’s President William Ruto has sworn in a new cabinet as he seeks to rebuild the government after he dismissed almost all the country’s ministers following large-scale protestors. After weeks of instability, the stakes couldn’t be higher for Ruto’s new cabinet given that protestors have been threatening to resume demonstrations.

Dozens of people have been killed in Kenya over the last few months, following the government’s proposals to introduce a new fiscal bill which seeks to heighten taxes. Demonstrations reached their zenith protestors stormed the Kenyan parliament on 25 June as wider unrest saw government forces and demonstrators clash.

The proposed bill (which was later dropped) looked to raise an additional $2.3bn over the coming year, through raising taxes and cutting public spending. With Kenya’s Debt-to-GDP also standing at 68%, concern has been growing in Nairobi over the country’s fiscal position. Already, just under 40% of Kenya’s tax revenues is spent on covering the interest payments on its debt.

One of Ruto’s appointees is John Mbadi who will now serve as Kenya’s head of Treasury. It is understood that he will seek to shift Kenya’s debt profile away from commercial loans (which apparently make up for around 25% of Kenya’s external debt) and instead towards loans from multilateral agencies, along with bilateral debt.

The benchmark Nikkei 225 Index closed around ¾ of a percent lower on Thursday, putting an end to two days of gains that followed last week’s sell-off which continued through to Monday. The Nikkei’s losses were more marginal than that of the Topix Index though, which lost 1.11% on Thursday’s session.

Despite the BoJ’s Deputy governor Shinichi Uchida attempts to settle the markets yesterday, which included him saying that “it is necessary to maintain current levels of monetary easing for the time being”, Thursday’s session saw markets react to the BoJ’s minutes.

Given that these minutes included reference to how members called for the need to tighten rates, such a hawkish stance put pressure on equities. One policy member even signalled how rates should be incrementally brought to 1%, something which would mark a major adjustment to Japan’s negative rate environment which was only moved to 0.1% in March, before being tightened to 0.25% last week.

As with yesterday, attention now turns to the European and North American sessions, including US initial jobless claims released today.