The sanctions against Russia appear as if they may seriously hurt big western energy companies such as Exxon Mobil, BP, and Total that have large joint investments with Russian energy companies and stand to profit from joint ventures. Other companies such as Halliburton and Schlumberger have much to lose from sanctions. Why is it that there is not more resistance from global capital to moves that will obviously hurt their profit picture? It is that the sanctions have less bite then appears at first sight? The effect of these types of sanctions will be to encourage a China Russia and perhaps BRIC alignment that could challenge the EU US axis.Instead of globalization of capital we seem to have a situation where competing global blocs are being formed.