Summary:
Congress pushes ahead with sanctions threat. The big elephant in the room, when it comes to longer-term growth in the economy is the threat of additional US sanctions. Now that the Senate has voted for tougher sanctions, attention will shift to the House of Representatives and then it will be seen whether President Trump is willing or able to block a sanctions extension. If a tougher sanctions regime is adopted by the US, the EU is not expected to follow but Russia will almost certainly retaliate in some way.