Massive bets on the fall of the euro: the main news by the morning of September 26

• Hedge funds are betting on the fall of the euro. The volume of short positions on the euro from hedge funds has approached an annual maximum, as investors assume that the ECB has completed the cycle of raising interest rates. The CFTC data also showed that investors using leverage increased the number of short positions on the euro to 23,306 contracts for the week ended September 19.

• Oleg Deripaska criticizes the sanctions. In an interview with the Financial Times, the founder of Rusal said that Western sanctions against Russia are an outdated tool and are not effective. The billionaire expected that the Russian economy would collapse by 30% due to sanctions restrictions, but this did not happen. 

• Most of the Russian oil is transported by European tankers. According to CREA, up to 60% of Russian oil and petroleum products supplies are transported by sea by ships insured or owned by countries that comply with the «price ceiling», even despite exceeding the maximum prices imposed by the G7.

• The deal to exit KFC from the Russian market was suspended due to only one OFAC publication. The reason was the «exit tax» — the contribution of the outgoing company to the budget of Russia. The deal with KFC was almost ready when OFAC stated that a separate license from Washington was needed to pay the «tax».

• Ford stops the construction of the plant. The American car company stops the construction of a new production of electric vehicles in Michigan. A representative of the company said that a decision on whether the plant will be put into operation in the future has not yet been made. The project is estimated at $3.5 billion.

• Azerbaijan and Turkey have launched the construction of a new branch of the TANAP gas pipeline. The Ygdyr-Nakhichevan branch line will pass through the cities of the same name of the two states, 85 km of them on the territory of Turkey. The pipeline's capacity will be 500 million cubic meters per year.