They would never say this publicly for diplomatic reasons. But I think it is not a coincidence that
- the US sanctions came into force on 21st November. Just two days before the meeting.
The two Russian oil giants Lukoil and Rosneft have lost almost all their international assets in countries that trade with the US including oil refineries - those have already been sold most of them. It also can no longer trade with other companies that want to sell its oil or products to the USA or Western Europe.
It had immediate effect.
So - Trump very publicly attacked Ukraine. But by using this he distracted the public and the mainstream media from the sanction date on Russian oil. Russia and Ukraine are fine with going along with this.
- Russia wants to continue to claim to its citizens that it is highly regarded in the world and that sanctions have negligible effect.
- Ukraine wants a peace treaty not to humiliate Russia
- same for its European allies.
The date itself had an immediate impact, on that day Lukoil dissolved its international board.
QUOTE STARTS
Lukoil has dissolved the supervisory board of its international business due to US sanctions pressure. The company’s management is concentrated in the hands of managing director Alexander Matitsyn; despite the reorganization, the international structure remains under Lukoil’s control.
The report states that Lukoil International received 95 billion euros in revenue and 7.8 billion euros in net profit – against the backdrop of the peak energy crisis in Europe.
https://unn.ua/en/news/lukoil-dissolves-international-board-of-directors-due-to-us-sanctions-pressure-bloomberg
Buyers of oil have been waiting out to see how the sanctions work and some were still buying Russian oil but stopped recently. Because if they buy Russian crude oil and mix it with their oil in their refinery they can no longer sell it to US or European countries which are a big part of their revenue.
It’s sales of oil products and chemicals are at their lowest ever already and this is the 14 day rolling average
Overlay text on graphic
Large red text:
- Ukraine and its allies don’t mention this, want peace not to humiliate Russia
Large blue text:
Large red text:
Large purple text:
- OPINION: Putin as an oligarch who earned his wealth from the government funds via corruption and perhaps the world’s first trillionaire may be likely to pay especial attention to funding and finance issues
Large red text:
the government domestic reserves are likely to fall fast
there is a limit to how much ordinary Russians can be taxed and remain in support of him enough to continue as their leader even with rigged elections
Two labels:
The vertical dotted line shows when the war started
Graphic from:
https://www.russiafossiltracker.com/
Then there are several other factors.
Ukrainian oil strikes have
- Stopped a fifth of the Russian oil refinery capacity
- So far they have been able to use spare oil refining capacity to compensate for the losses but it’s not clear how long the Russians can keep this up.
https://energynews.oedigital.com/jet-fuel/2025/11/13/sources-say-that-russia-is-using-its-spare-capacity-for-oil-refining-to-compensate-for-drone-damage-in-ukraine
The oil and gas revenue for the government depends on the amount of oil produced rather than the amount exported so the effects are indirect.
The government gets much of its income from a mineral oil extraction tax. But the more this continues the more it will affect how much oil can be profitably extracted.
QUOTE STARTS
The oil and gas revenue in the budget depends not on the volume of exports, but rather on the volume of oil production. The treasury largely fills its coffers with a mineral extraction tax, which is calculated on the basis of the average export price of Urals crude oil in dollars, the ruble exchange rate and a number of other variables.
If oil producers have nowhere for their oil to go, budget revenue falls due to a drop in production.
Therefore, if oil producers have nowhere for their oil to go, budget revenue falls due to a drop in production. The key question now is how long any lull in buying Russian oil will last.
German economist Janis Kluge, a researcher at the Berlin-based German Institute for International and Security Affairs (SWP), believes that the drop in exports will be temporary and Russian oil will find its way back on to the world market soon enough. “But Rosneft and Lukoil have to rebuild some of their supply chains, maybe also find new business partners or markets, which means lower effective export revenues,” he told Novaya Europe.
But there are two other reasons the budget will be short on tax revenue too. First, the mineral extraction tax will fall as sanctions raise the cost of transporting oil, because, as Kluge says, there is almost no “clean”, i.e. unsanctioned, Urals crude oil on the market. To transport sanctioned oil by sea, Russia would need to grow its “shadow fleet”, which is expensive.
Secondly, sanctions are increasing the difference in the price between Russian oil and Brent. This year, that has fluctuated between $5 and $7. Kluge thinks that could grow by an additional $10 per barrel and Russian oil could be $15–$17 cheaper than Brent, which was trading at $64 per barrel on Friday, potentially a huge blow to Russia’s wartime budget.
https://novayagazeta.eu/articles/2025/11/17/double-whammy-en
Russia also gets some income from the oil industry by income tax, by dividends from state owned
Russia is currently having to buy gasoline from abroad for its own vehicles. Including for the army of course.
It has to use funds from the Federal budget to subsidize imports. This is a direct result of the Ukrainian drone strikes on Russia’s ability to make gasoline for itself - which Ukraine justifies because Russia uses the refined oil to supply the war, the tanks, jets, missiles etc are all fueled by refined oil - and its revenues from the refined oil.
QUOTE STARTS
According to the outlet, Russia is considering importing fuel from China, South Korea, and Singapore to stabilize its domestic market.
To facilitate imports, the Russian government reportedly plans to lift import duties on fuel entering through select checkpoints in the Far East. The state will also subsidize importers by covering the gap between global market prices and lower domestic fuel prices, utilizing funds from the federal budget.
…
Moscow also reportedly plans to boost gasoline imports from Belarus and lift a ban on monomethylaniline, an octane-boosting additive used to increase fuel production at refineries. The chemical has been banned in Russia since 2016 due to its toxicity and potential cancer risks.
In a written appeal to Russian Prime Minister Mikhail Mishustin, Deputy Prime Minister Alexander Novak warned that the risk of further deterioration in Russia’s domestic fuel supply remains, despite the government’s planned interventions, Kommersant reported, citing the document.
https://kyivindependent.com/russia-to-begin-importing-gasoline-from-asia-after-losing-nearly-40-of-refining-capacity-media-reports/
The Russian government also gets dividends because of ownership staeks from both Lukoil and Rosneft. Rosneft is state controlled.
Then Russia also pays out negative excise duties to oil refineries when oil prices are high to keep them operating.
I would need to check out details to find out more but the oil industry in Russia is intriciately tied with the government revenue.
- Sanctions on Lukoil and Rosneft directly impact on the government revenue.
- The government revenue also has an indirect effect on Putin’s personal income - this is well established though its difficult to trace because he is in control of the Russian judiciary and political and legal processes generally, and the corruption is hidden through many indirect ways to lever his personal influence on the flow of money from the government to the accounts of oligarchs who supply services and the wealth is obscured by being owned by members of his family and associates and shell companies and so on.
https://www.perplexity.ai/search/get-text-from-the-attached-gra-yexNl7WgTmK1qxx_rxivig#7
Also - the war is stagnating in Donetsk.
OPINION: Putin wants to take Pokrovsk but he is unlikely to close that pocket before 2026. He may be trying to delay things just to end on an “up” by taking Pokrovsk a very small city of no strategic value any more but of a great deal of value in terms of internal politics as an announcement he can make on TASS to Russians because of the way he built it up.
As it is now it will likely be in the demilitarized zone in any final ceasefire. It might even be divided between Russia and Ukraine.
It seems completely closed from this map from ISW but in reality even the pink areas are most of them just held by a few Russian soldiers on the ground because of the drones in the area.
Ukraine are supplying Myrnohard by using Black Hawk helicopters supplied by its allies as well as using ground drones that can send supplies in on the ground without risking human lives.
They are able to do counteroffensives and the situation is not stable in either direction when there are so few soldiers and many areas have russians and ukrainians in close proximity on the ground.
If you look at the Deep State map I think it presents it more accurately. It has a “gray area” which is not controlled by Russia or Ukraine. It’s similar to the ISW “claimed Russian control” but that area is actually a disputed area where BOTH Russia and Ukraine claim control so the ISW tends to give an impression that Russia controls more than it does.
Basically if there are equal numbers of Russian and Ukrainian soldiers in an area, ISW is likely to show it as claimed Russian control because Russia do claim control, but so does Ukraine.
This is the Deep State map and click on the flag to switch it to English if not set to English already (unless you speak / read Ukrainian of course)
The map his here https://deepstatemap.live/en/#12/48.3626365/37.2906876
Unlike the ISW map you can click to go back and forward along the timeline and you can see how very slow the Russian advance is.
This shows how far the Russian army advanced in 31 days - about 3.41 km. Or a little over 100 meters a day. And even the areas shown in deep red are deep into the drone kill zone and will only be held by a few Russian soldiers hiding in the ruins and rarely leaving their hideout. Same also for Ukrainian areas.
Myrnohard is surrounded by open countryside and is well fortified, and for as long as the Ukrainians can continue to supply it, it can hold out. It likely has very few actual soldiers protecting it and mainly drones.
OPINION: Putin may try to delay the negotiations for a few days or a week or two to try to get Pokrovsk. He may think he can get it before the end of the year.
But that is optimistic. After all look at how long it took for Russia to take the Azov steel works in 2022. That was a similar situation, a holdout held by a few soldiers who stayed there for weeks even long after they could leave.
It depends on how much Ukraine wants to hold onto it. But there are good reasons to stay there. To put more pressure on Putin and to avoid the propaganda win of getting Pokrovsk which might put them at a slight disadvantage in negotiations. And they can do that by committing only a few experienced soldiers and large numbers of drones in the area.
But he is under a lot of financial pressure to quit.
Plus Ukraine has had problems scaling up its production of the Flamingo cruise missile but this may change.
And on the negative side for Russia, if Putin shows to Trump that he is not interested in a fair peace plan then Trump can once again threaten the tomahawks. Ukraine has better with the Flamingo but still in low numbers. It would be largely symbolic but he can privately hint that he could send thousands to Ukraine which would significantly shift things.
Also there’s the idea of a psychological level on the Black Sea Fleet that I talked about.
It’s not impossible that there is some psychological leverage going on as well in the background. This would never be disclosed publicly but might emerge later in leaks after a peace treaty.
BLOG: Zelensky hints he can liberate occupied Ukraine by owning but NOT USING Tomahawk
— As a psychological lever?
— Putin would concede much
— if alternative is 1st president to lose the Black Sea Fleet
— Zelensky says the aim is to get Putin to the ceasefire negotiating table
— so this would likely be done secretly and likely with concessions that fall short of regaining ALL of occupied Ukraine
You can read it here:
https://shortdebunks.substack.com/p/to-end-the-war-and-liberate-all-of
I think it is well possible that Trump has privately used this lever whatever it is that Zelensky hinted at on several occasions. It’s just my guess that it’s the Black Sea fleet - but whatever it is, it is a way to end the war without using the lever whatever it is.
Zelensky has kept it vague and will surely not spell out what it is until well after any peace treaty. But I think whatever it is, that it is likely a factor too.
