Europe has also had a very mild winter, so luck played a nontrivial role.
> Now that the Western sanctions are strangling Russian economy
I'm very curious about how Western sanctions are affecting the Russian economy (I understand that you're speaking narrowly to Gazprom, but I'm asking about the Russian economy more broadly). My understanding is that Putin has spent the better part of the last decade immunizing the Russian economy from Western sanctions, and that this project has largely succeeded--that Russian oil sales are still making plenty of money to finance his invasion, etc. Can anyone elucidate?
Russian attempts to withstand the economic pressure of sanctions have been successful insofar as to prevent a collapse, but the pressure is crushing on all aspects of the economy, as well as any hopes for Russia for economic and industrial development. Brain drain, loss of foreign investment, technology imports, diminishing consumer activity, falling real estate markets - are just some of the headwinds that are in effect outside the energy sanctions.
The budget revenue deficit for just the January of this year exceeds the deficit for the entirety of 2022. Russia has reserves that it can employ for the time being to mitigate some of the damage, but they are not bottomless. If the pace of losses continues in a similar manner - most of the reserves will be exhausted by years end.
After that - one might expect the usual tools to be employed - cutting budgets to pay for civil workers (everyone other than security), pensions etc, attempts to raise money from already struggling businesses via wartime taxes, issuance of wartime bonds to population to borrow cash, and if all fails - start printing money to plug the budgetary shortfalls, and the resulting inflation.
> Brain drain, loss of foreign investment, technology imports, diminishing consumer activity, falling real estate markets
I dont think the kremlin cares for any of these, except may be with brain drain (which they can easily fix by preventing movement of people).
As long as russia produces enough food for the population, a subsistence living is "good enough" in the eyes of the kremlin, and thus these sanctions doesn't hurt as much as the west had hoped.
It’s hard to wage full-scale war on proceeds from subsistence economy. The sanctions aim to cut off income that Kremlin can use to finance war - they are effective, if slow acting. They also aim to avoid being a double-sided blade and inflict economic hardship on Russia while sparing the West as much as possible - they have largely accomplished that as well.
Europe has also had a very mild winter, so luck played a nontrivial role.
> Now that the Western sanctions are strangling Russian economy
I'm very curious about how Western sanctions are affecting the Russian economy (I understand that you're speaking narrowly to Gazprom, but I'm asking about the Russian economy more broadly). My understanding is that Putin has spent the better part of the last decade immunizing the Russian economy from Western sanctions, and that this project has largely succeeded--that Russian oil sales are still making plenty of money to finance his invasion, etc. Can anyone elucidate?