FT reporter posts after a day of relentless drone attacks, Russia is now hitting Kyiv with a wave of ballistic missiles and several explosions have shaken Ukraine's capital in the last few minutes

Escalatory strikes on Kyiv of this kind have, across the course of the conflict, followed a recognisable market sequence: an initial risk-off move in European assets, a bid into gold, dollar and front-end energy futures, and a fade once the attack is confirmed as a discrete strike wave rather than a change in the conflict's trajectory. The distinction worth drawing is between strikes that presage a structural shift, such as attacks on energy infrastructure or Western-supplied assets, and those that fit the established pattern of retaliation, since the former have historically re-priced European gas and power premia while the latter have tended to mean-revert within the session. Tracking through social media and wire posts rather than official channels is itself part of the precedent here, since early sourcing of this kind has often been revised or supplemented by formal statements, which changes the assessment. The actors are familiar: Russia's missile and drone campaigns have historically intensified around diplomatic junctures or in response to Ukrainian operations, and the composition of Ukraine's air defence support has been a recurring follow-on question. Worth watching is any official confirmation from either side, whether energy or critical infrastructure is among the targets, and whether NATO-adjacent statements follow. As reported commentary at unverified stage, the signal is directional on the conflict escalation side rather than informational on specifics.