RUSSIA ECONOMICS
Analyst
Evgeny Gavrilenkov
Former Investment Bank Chief EconomistDatabanks
Recent Country Insights
2024 GDP growth revised higher, prompting deceleration in 2025
RUSSIA ECONOMICS · In Brief · 14 Apr 2025
Rosstat published the long-awaited revised quarterly GDP statistics for 2022-2024 and the updated 2024 annual growth figure. The latter now stands at 4.3% versus the 4.1% initial flash estimate. It means that in 2024, economic growth reportedly accelerated as the 2023 GDP grew by 4.1%. Seasonally...
Russia: a brief market watch
RUSSIA ECONOMICS · In Brief · 10 Apr 2025
The Russian financial markets have been under pressure recently, as the "tariff war" story affected markets worldwide. Fears of slower economic growth and an acceleration of inflation globally were extrapolated to the Russian story. Even though Russian financial markets remain ring-fenced from th...
Federal budget performance improves in March
RUSSIA ECONOMICS · In Brief · 09 Apr 2025
The Ministry of Finance reported that in 1Q25, federal budget revenues reached nearly R9.1 trln and were up by 3.8% y-o-y. Oil-and-gas (O&G) revenues accounted for 29.2% of total revenues and were down by 9.8% y-o-y. The non-O&G revenues grew by 10.6% y-o-y, which is more or less in line with the...
Economic activity remains moderate in February, and the trend to persist in 2025
RUSSIA ECONOMICS · In Brief · 03 Apr 2025
Rosstat reported that the output of the five basic sectors (a monthly proxy for aggregate economic activity accounting for industry, agriculture, construction, transportation, and trade) grew by 1.7% y-o-y in 2M25 and 0.3% y-o-y in February alone. The y-o-y numbers look unimpressive (especially i...
Industrial growth to moderate this year
RUSSIA ECONOMICS · In Brief · 27 Mar 2025
Rosstat reported that in 2M22, the industrial output grew by a mere 1.2% y-o-y, which looked weaker than January’s 2.2% y-o-y growth. In February alone, the y-o-y growth remained almost non-existent (up by 0.2%). The unimpressive February growth figure largely stems from the base effect, as 2024 ...
Russia: a brief market watch
RUSSIA ECONOMICS · In Brief · 27 Mar 2025
After the USD/RUB shortly moved close to the 80 mark, the ruble weakened slightly, and in the past ten days, the USD/RUB rate fluctuated within the 80-85 range. It won’t be surprising to see some more ruble weakening in the weeks ahead as the current level looks too strong from the fundamental po...
Russian macro: a difficult year ahead
RUSSIA ECONOMICS · Forecast · 18 Mar 2025
According to Rosstat’s publications, after having soared in December 2024, the Russian economy posted comparatively unimpressive results in January, as the output of the five basic sectors grew by 3.1% y-o-y. In December, it grew by 7.5%. This indicator is a monthly measure of combined activities...
Revised balance of payments statistics shed some light on recent FX trends and budget revenues
RUSSIA ECONOMICS · In Brief · 13 Mar 2025
The Central Bank just published its flash estimate of the key constituencies of the balance of payments for 2M25 and revised data for 4Q24. The revisions appeared quite significant, and the CBR referred to some updated foreign trade statistics it recently collected. We recently mentioned on sever...
Russia: a brief market watch
RUSSIA ECONOMICS · In Brief · 13 Mar 2025
The Russian market remains positive, assuming the possibility of a peace settlement in Ukraine. The latter encouraged investors to bet on further strengthening of the ruble, and it went from R/$89 to R/$85 after the start of negotiations between the US and Ukraine in Saudi Arabia. However, other ...