Guggenheim's Scott Minerd warns Russia could strike back at Western sanctions with cyberattacks to cripple financial markets

• Russia may strike out at Western nations via cyberattacks that could crash markets, Scott Minerd said.
• "If they cripple the payments system, it's going to seize up markets," he told Bloomberg Tuesday.

Russia's next move might be to target financial markets through cyber warfare in retaliation of the West's sanctions, according to Guggenheim's Scott Minerd.

"The likelihood of a cyberattack on our payments system is high," he told Bloomberg, according to a Tuesday report. "If they cripple the payments system, it's going to seize up markets."

Minerd cautioned about outdated technologies last year. He said there are high chances of an attack on the global payments system that could cause markets to crash.

In the wake of Vladimir Putin's military clash with Ukraine, Russia has been slammed with sanctions in recent days. The US and its allies have blocked Russia from international trade by cutting off some banks from the SWIFT payments system, freezing its ability to transact globally.

Russia hasn't executed any cyberattack so far, and Minerd did say that any such attack would result in temporary disruption and Ukraine would likely be the primary target, Bloomberg said.

Still, Minerd said he is still placing some bets in markets that are dealing with the risk of contagion within the global financial system stemming from sanctions against Russia.

"We're trying to buy high-yield bonds and bank loans, but the trading is so thin," he said.

He's also buying beaten-down payments stocks in the Americas, he said.

"These were the darlings of the Covid-era, and they've been beat up, they're cash-flow positive and have very reasonable multiples," he said. "These are growth stocks."

Minerd isn't the only market expert to have warned against cyber warfare from Russia. Wedbush cautioned last week that a surge of cyber security attacks from Russia state-sponsored organizations could change the game for not just US and European enterprises, but for governments too in the coming months.

After President Joe Biden announced punitive measures last week, US officials told businesses and government leaders to watch out for ransomware attacks and called Russia a "permissive operating environment" for cybercriminals, CNN reported.

Notably, Japanese automotive maker Toyota shut its factories Monday after a suspected cyber attack. Japan has joined Western nations in imposing economic sanctions on Russia for its bloody incursion into Ukraine.

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