ZeroHedge: 'In late March when the Bank of Russia offered to buy gold from Russian banks at a fixed price of 5000 rubles per gram, this was the first step in linking the ruble to gold. That move also put a floor price under the ruble and acted as a catalyst for the ruble to re-strengthen ground against the US dollar that had been lost in late February / early March.
'During the same week in late March, Putin also informed the global market that non-friendly importers of Russian gas would have to pay for Russian natural gas using rubles. That move (which we are now seeing playing out in the EU) was the other side of the equation, linking the ruble to commodities.
'This was all laid out in the Q&A article that I wrote for RT.com and which can be seen here on the BullionStar website titled “Russian Ruble relaunched linked to Gold and Commodities – RT.com Q and A”, and which was a big hit on ZeroHedge with more than 650,000 views.'