Economic Sanctions and Their Effect on Currency

Our vocabulary today is related to economic sanctions and their impact on currency. If you are listening to this lesson on a podcast, I want you to know that you can also watch the lesson on video on my website. Watching the lesson gives you the benefit of seeing, not just hearing, the highlighted words. CURTAIN Here are our keywords and expressions. You will hear me use them later in context. Listen closely: Economic sanctions: Commercial and financial penalties applied by one country against another. Note the verb I used: Apply. Countries apply sanctions. You can also say that countries “impose” sanctions or “levy” sanctions. So, you apply, impose and levy sanctions. Ruble: Russia’s currency. Note the pronunciation. Slump: To suddenly decrease in value. Other words you can use are “plunge” and “plummet”. It’s often used to talk about the fall in the value of a currency. Bank run: When large groups of depositors withdraw their money from banks at the same time. This causes extreme stress on the bank. Queue:  A lineup of people is a queue. You can also use it as a verb: “to queue” means “to line up”. ATM: ATM stands for Automated Teller Machines, the machines you use to access your bank account and withdraw cash. To shore up: to support something in order to keep it from falling. Downgrade: To reduce to a lower rank. Junk status: Below an acceptable investment grade. Okay, friends. The most important news this week, without a doubt, is the military invasion of Ukraine by Russia. Most countries have been quick to condemn the aggression and many major economies have applied economic sanctions to punish Russia. These economic sanctions levied against Russia have had a dramatic impact on Russia’s currency, the ruble. On Monday, the ruble slumped 20%. This sudden fall created a panic among some Russians who began to queue at the ATMs to withdraw cash.