Russian Court Fines Google More Money Than The World's GDP

A Russian court has fined Google $2.5 decillion, which is more than the world’s GDP, for allegedly blocking pro-Kremlin propaganda on YouTube. The fine, which is written as 20 followed by 33 zeros, came following complaints by 17 Russian TV channels after their accounts on YouTube were blocked as a result of international sanctions.

The court ruled that Google had to pay a fine of 100,000 Rubles ($1,025) per day, with the total fine doubling every week.

The court case started in 2020 after the Google-owned YouTube blocked accounts for Russian ultra-nationalist station Tsargrad, after its owner fell foul of US sanctions.

Other Russian stations joined the lawsuit in 2022, after YouTube blocked their accounts following Russia’s invasion of Ukraine. Google, which reported revenue of $306 billion last year, restricted the creation of new accounts for Russian users last month and deactivated AdSense accounts in the country in August.

Online ads have also not been served to Google users in Russia since March 2022 as part of broader sanctions against Russia.

The restrictions prompted Russian authorities to seize Google’s bank accounts, forcing the US firm’s Russian subsidiary to file for bankruptcy. Google’s free services, including YouTube and Search, have continued to operate in Russia.

Google acknowledged its ongoing legal issues in Russia in its latest quarterly results, which were published on Tuesday evening.

“We have ongoing legal matters relating to Russia,” the company noted in the report.

“For example, civil judgments that include compounding penalties have been imposed upon us in connection with disputes regarding the termination of accounts, including those of sanctioned parties.

“We do not believe these ongoing legal matters will have a material adverse effect.” According to the World Bank, global GDP stands at around $100 trillion, or $100,000,000,000,000.

The market value of Google's parent company, Alphabet, stands at 2% of that, or $2,000,000,000,000.

The fine appeared to have no impact on Alphabet, which saw its shares rise more than 5 percent in after-market trading on Tuesday after beating its third-quarter earnings expectations.

Russian Courts a bit of a misnomer imho.

But let's see them collect that amount.

Anyhoo thoughts and opinions fellow members on Mad Vlads latest ""hair-brained"" scheme doomed to failure.

www.businessinsider.com...
www.lbc.co.uk... UAJ88cjIgvphQIXvWNAkSCmQ3quRj-w_aem_wdf_zPm_LwIT-NHjHHCfTg

I like it.

I still like it.

a reply to: Kaiju666

More chance of harvesting the gold from the likes of 16 Psyche methinks.

Which is worth $100,000 quadrillion or thereabouts.

originally posted by: andy06shake
a reply to: Kaiju666

More chance of harvesting the gold from the likes of 16 Psyche methinks.

Which is worth $100,000 quadrillion or thereabouts.

It’s not though is it. At current prices it is, but start mining it and the price drops. Not really worth the effort in reality. But I get your point.

a reply to: ARM19688



Well, there goes the market for a start.

Which would be the salient point.

If one nation controlled all the money, it would make traditional currency systems obsolete.

totally not the point of the OP, but damn:

The market value of Google's parent company, Alphabet, stands at 2% of that, or $2,000,000,000,000.

I was unaware of how powerful they had become. That's a frighteningly large number for a company.

a reply to: network dude

Astronomical really.

And frightening.

Take the likes of the multinational investment company BlackRock which as you probably know is is the world's largest asset manager.

They control around $11.5 trillion.

Google's(Alphabet) up there but not at the top just yet.

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originally posted by: network dude
totally not the point of the OP, but damn:

The market value of Google's parent company, Alphabet, stands at 2% of that, or $2,000,000,000,000.

I was unaware of how powerful they had become. That's a frighteningly large number for a company.

Since I live and work in Silicon Valley, I have gotten used to the mind boggling wealth created and held by companies like Apple, Google, and Facebook (going up the Valley from South to North). Together they have a net worth of about 6.85 Trillion dollars which--coincidentally--is about the Purchasing Power of Russia. Throw in Netflix, and Silicon Valley has a bigger economy than Russia.

I had a friend who retired from the NSA and went to work for Google a few years ago on a remote sensing project they were thinking about implementing using some of their AI algorithms on satellite images. They paid him 250 K$ per year and told him to go off and spend a couple of months thinking about the problem and then come back with a work plan. I used to go and visit him for free lunch at Googlandia (my name for their headquarters). Every day you could go to a different Google building and get a different cuisine from around the world. The work force was totally representative of the world, as well. You would have a female Israeli software engineer working next to a French male physicist, working next to my friend, who was from rural Missouri, working next to a transgender Indian, etc., etc. They would just hire the best and brightest from around the world, put them in Googlandia and turn them loose on wild and crazy projects. My friend quickly figured out that the problem they gave him to work on had no business case to be made for it at all, so he told them as much. They said they knew that but it didn't matter; almost all their profit comes from their search algorithms. That provides enough cash flow to fund everything else. He lasted about a year and a half and eventually decided he would prefer to work on something that had a chance of becoming real.

I had another friend who got the obligatory 250K$ year to work at Facebook (or the principality of Zuckerburgh, as I like to call it). He was designing high-altitude, long-endurance solar-powered aircraft as a replacement for satellites for data relay. Same story--free lunches and terrific pay for a project that was soon cancelled because there was no business case for it.

Now I'm back to buying my own lunches.

Meanwhile the Russian Ruble has droppd to ever so slightly more than one cent: $.0103

If Russia can have the trial moved to New York City and get Judge Erdogan to preside, they should win the settlement.

But lose the appeal.