The main events by the morning: August 21

• Democrats have officially nominated Kamala Harris as a candidate for the presidency of the United States. At the national party congress in Chicago, 4,566 delegates supported her candidacy. Harris was not present in Chicago at the time of the vote and participated in the ceremony via video link.

• Gas consumption in China may increase by 1.5 times. Currently, consumption is about 400 billion cubic meters per year, but an increase of another 200 billion is expected. Currently, Russia is actively supplying gas to China via the Power of Siberia gas pipeline and continues negotiations on the Power of Siberia 2 project. According to Bloomberg data, Gazprom's supplies to China increased by 33% in July.

• Real inflation in Russia has reached 71.4% since the beginning of its development, according to the data of the ROMIR research holding. The grocery basket used for calculations included everyday goods of Russians for the period from 2008 to 2023. Annual inflation for goods by July 2024 amounted to 21.2%, which is 2.3 times higher than the official data of Rosstat.

• The Dubai court recognized the legitimate payment of salaries in cryptocurrency. This decision has special weight, since in 2023 the court rejected a similar lawsuit on the legality of payment for labor in cryptocurrency. Then the reason for the refusal was the lack of an accurate assessment of the "crypt". Now, the position of the UAE court of first instance on cryptocurrencies is beginning to change, which signals the country's "progressive approach" to decentralized finance in the economy.

• The salaries of migrant couriers in Russia have caught up with the salaries of IT workers: 147 thousand. vs 155 thousand rubles per month. The average incomes of couriers who do not have Russian citizenship increased by 40% YoY in June and reached 147 thousand rubles. The same dynamics is observed among builders, cleaners, drivers and handymen. The reason is the personnel shortage.