FX.co ★ Trump annoyed by pipeline dollars flowing from Europe to Russia

Not all the money brings joy to billionaire and concurrently US President Donald Trump. It turned out that even the dedicated capitalist can be annoyed by certain money flows. Particularly, by those that pass him by. One of such flows is connected with the Nord Stream 2. Trump has even introduced a new notion – the pipeline dollars. He used these words to describe the money that the European Union spends for Russian gas.

Still, his words make sense. Donald Trump thinks that buying gas from Russia is not a deal but financial aid on the back of sanctions. “Billions of additional dollars are being spent by NATO countries since my visit last year, at my request, but it isn't nearly enough. U.S. spends too much. Europe's borders are bad! Pipeline dollars to Russia are not acceptable,” Trump said. The United States stands against building the gas pipeline as part of the Nord Stream 2 project. The companies that participate in this project face a risk of being put under sanctions. “We have been clear that firms working in the Russian energy export pipeline sector are engaging in a line of business that carries sanctions risk,” the US State Department said.

On the other hand, this supposedly political rhetoric seems to have economic background. The United States has long wanted to squeeze Russia out of the European gas market, but so far it has no success in doing it. Nowadays, it is economically viable to export gas from the United States thanks to the modern transporting technologies. That is why most experts believe that Donald Trump is irritated as the US loses hypothetical big profits in so-called pipeline dollars.