According to a poll of 14 economists, who had greatly differing views on what to expect in the year to come, the Russian economy is set to contract by 2.5% in 2009, which is close to the official forecast from the government, expecting contraction to reach 2.2

In a further attempt to buoy the Russian rouble’s value, the Russian Central Bank has revealed a further injection of 95.33 billion roubles in seven day funds offered at 12%. The funds were introduced to the banking system on 24 February in a repo auction.

For the Russians who took out loans and mortgages in other currencies, the reduction in the rouble’s value has been extremely damaging.

In January 2009, the industrial product of Russia fell 20%, which is the largest decline since records began in 2002.

Oil prices and liquidity shortages have helped to boost the Russian rouble, which strengthened to 39.37 against a basket of Dollars/Euros on 12 February.

Following the establishment a floor to the value of the weakening rouble, the Russian Central Bank has fulfilled its promise to tighten monetary policy to support the currency.

Alfa Bank and UniCredit have accused the Russian Central Bank of exacerbating the fall of the rouble.

Following a strong valuation of its share price, Russia’s second largest lender, VTB, enjoyed a 5.4 per cent increase in its share price on Tuesday 18 August.
The increase in price, to 0.043 roubles per share, came after reports from Reuters that its shares had been independently valued at 0.048 roubles per share. This represented a [...]