Vladimir Putin and his cronies in the Kremlin are reportedly celebrating Donald Trump’s tariffs on the rest of the world as they help “rejuvenate Russia‘s economy”.

The US President’s trade taxes apply around the globe, but not Russia, and a senior US official said it was was “not appropriate” to target Putin during negotiations over peace with Ukraine.

But the BBC‘s respected Moscow correspondent, Steve Rosenberg, said Russia saw the US move not to impose penalties as an “important signal” of growing relations between the two nations.

Writing on X, Mr Rosenberg said Russia newspapers ran some very positive headlines today (Monday), with one writing under the headline “Trump rejuvenates Russia‘s economy”.

The newspaper Komsomolskaya Pravda quoted Russian official, Boris Titov, Putin’s special representative for international organisations, who claimed that: “Trump is rejuvenating the Russian economy, the absence of tariffs is an opportunity to increase exports and develop new sectors for our markets and the American markets.

“Many countires who’ve been tariffed will come to use and invest in production in Russia, like the Chinese with their cars. This will lead to the long-awaited diversification and growth of our economy.”

And the BBC reports the US National Economic Council director Kevin Hassett told ABC News: “I think the president made the decision not to conflate the two issues.

“It doesn’t mean that Russia, in the fullness of time, is going to be treated wildly different than every other country.”

In the UK the FTSE 100 of top British companies has plunged to a one-year low as fears deepen over the global impact of Donald Trump‘s tariffs, despite Sir Keir Starmer promising new measures to support under-pressure manufacturers.

Analysts have warned that the scale of disruption in global financial markets is one of the worst to be felt in decades.

The index, which tracks the country’s top 100 listed firms, dropped by about 5% in early trading on Monday as a sharp sell-off kicked in shortly after markets opened.

The panicked mood was felt across Europe, with Germany’s Dax index recording a drop of about 6.5%, and France’s Cac 40 down around 5.3% in the morning.

Overnight, Asian stocks across the board were sinking to new lows after Mr Trump said he will not back down on his sweeping import taxes unless countries even out their trade with the US.

The US president said overnight on Monday that he did not want global markets to fall, but also that he was not concerned about the major sell-off, adding: “Sometimes you have to take medicine to fix something.”

He also said he had spoken to leaders from around the world, adding that they were “dying to make a deal” with the US.