Russians Buy Jewelry, Hoard Dollars As Ruble Plunges

From Bloomberg:

Moscow resident Tima Kulikov banked on the full faith and credit of the U.S. government, not the Kremlin, when he sold his biggest asset for cash.

The 31-year-old director of a social networking Web site initially agreed to sell his apartment for rubles, then cringed at the thought of the currency weakening as it sat in a lockbox pending settlement of the contract. It wasn’t until the buyer showed up with $250,000 stacked in old mobile-phone boxes and stuffed in his pockets that Kulikov closed the deal.

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