Russia's isolation from global markets is withering its economy and will wreck its status as an energy superpower, experts say

Russia's resilience in the face of sanctions surprised experts, but there are growing signs that isolation will result in a withered economy for years to come, and a diminished standing as an energy superpower.

Russia has retaliated by shutting out the west, trading exclusively with friendly countries, andshoring up partnerships with nations that can stomach doing business with a pariah state.

It has succeeded in sowing chaos through its weaponization of the energy trade, recently stopping gas flows to Europe's keyNord Stream 1 line while selling its leftover fuel supplies to customers. In the first three months of the war, energy sales to Russia netted them over $24 billion.

According to a UC Berkeley economist, there are signs that Russia is going to pay a steep price for being isolated in the long run.

North Korea, Afghanistan, and Cuba are some of the countries where long-term stagnation is possible.

Russia's economic situation worsened in the run-up to its invasion of Ukraine. The country's GDP fell from $2.06 trillion in 2010 to $1.78 trillion in 2011. According to the International Monetary Fund, GDP will fall in 2011.

A markets professor at Boston University said that isolationism reduces the number of products that Russia can buy. It can only buy goods from India and Chinese manufactured goods. You end up not getting the highest quality or the best price when you limit yourself to a single country.

Russia's payment ban on the "unfriendly" US dollar is a huge barrier to foreign exchange transactions and makes imports more expensive.

According to Krugman, trade with non-sanctioning countries has decreased by 40% since the war ended.

The energy advantage is waning.

Russia's energy exports stand to benefit from all of this.

Oil and gas sales made up 45% of Russia's GDP last year. Much of the technology needed to power the industry is produced in the west, so boosting and maintaining energy production is dependent on being able to purchase the machinery.

Many of the oil field exploratory kits and machines are very high tech. There are systems that control things deep underground. It's not just a bunch of guys with sledgehammers.

Europe is shelling out billions to hike production over the next decade and the inability to invest in that technology will be a major roadblock to Russia's dominance in the energy market.

Russia is now selling oil to selected customers. China and India both have the ability to sell oil and gas to other customers for a profit. The nation cedes much of its power in the oil market because of that.

Since the war, Russia has quietly recorded its losses. Russia has incurred billions of dollars in direct losses from western sanctions, and its budget surplus has fallen by more than one billion dollars, according to internal documents.

The fact that they're not publishing a lot of economic data indicates that they know there are costs, but they would like to hide them, according to an economist. The invasion of the Ukraine on the Russian economy is being obscured by all of that.