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The Central Bank of Russia has  widened to Rb 9 fr om Rb 7  the  range  of  the acceptable  ruble value of the  dual-currency  basket (floating  trading band)  since August 18, 2014. The  range of the currency  trading  band  has been  shifted  by Rb 1 for  either  side of the trading  band  so that  the  floor  and  top  limits  are  set Rb 35,4 and  Rb 44,4  respectively (now  the dual-currency basket value is set  Rb 41,61).

In the centrally planned socialist autocracies of the past century, the state was in charge of everything, with only a few exceptions though: beginning with national defense and economic policy and ending with the production of irons and school uniform. Unlike buyers of second hand cars, individuals in the socialist block were well aware of the characteristics of the consumer goods produced in the country and the quality of public goods such as medical or education services offered by the regime.

Last year the lending market was characterized by high debt ratio. The share of payments for servicing households' debts to banks kept growing over the past year and reached more than 13% of the total households' disposable income by the middle of the current year. Last year the share stood at about 11%.

In pursuance of the Executive Order of the Government of the Russian Federation of August 7, 2014 No. 778 On Measures to Implement the Order of the President of the Russian Federation of August 6, 2014 No. 560 On Applying Certain Special Economic Measures to Ensure Security of the Russian Federation, a one-year ban has been imposed on import to the Russian Federation of agricultural products, raw materials and food products originating from the United States of America, EU member states, Canada, Australia and the Kingdom of Norway.

The US and EU authorities limited almost simultaneously the sources of funding for Russian state-owned banks. At present, apart from the Gazprombank and the Vneshekonombank the access to the US capital market is also closed to the Rosselkhozbank, the VTB and the Bank of Moscow. Also, the Sberbank is included in the sanction list.

 On July 25, the Board of Directors of the Central Bank of Russia has taken a decision to raise the key rate from 7.5% to 8.0%.

In June, the Ministry of Trade and Industry of the Russian Federation published officially for the first time on its site the list of entities included in the consolidated register of entities of the military-industrial sector (MIS). As compared to the first version (February 2013), the total number of entities included in the latest version of the register increased within 16 months by one entity to 1341, though in October 2013 it fell to 1330, while in April 2014 it rose again to 1339.

On July 22, 2014, a meeting of the WTO Dispute Settlement Body was held.

On July 21, 2014, the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD) presented on its site the full version of the Standard of the Automatic Exchange of Financial Account Information in Tax Matters.

At the meeting in Durban, South Africa, the leaders of five developing countries – Brazil, Russia, India, China and the Republic of South Africa – declared about their decision to establish the New Bank for Development (NBD) whose goal would consist in financing of infrastructure projects of developing economies.

The mode of new sanctions against Russia introduced this week by the US Treasury has a potential to produce a far more negative effect on the Russian economy as compared to those sanctions used by western partners before.

Both the estimate of the balance of payments in H1 2014 and the updated data for Q1 2014 permit to make the following conclusions as regards the state of financial operations of Russian residents with the outside world in 2014.

It was decided at a meeting held on June 18 by Prime Minister Dmitry Medvedev to ease the draft law on Controlled Foreign Corporations (CFCs). According to Kommersant newspaper, the Ministry of Finance prepared a letter to the Russian Government, prescribing new rules for CFCs which consider the requests of the Russian Union of Industrialists and Entrepreneurs (RUIE) and the Ministry of Economic Development of Russia.

The Ministry of Economic Development of Russia has recently announced that economic growth rates have accelerated fr om 0.9% to 1.2% on an annualized basis.

Federal Law of June 28, 2014 No. 201-FZ On Amendments to the Federal Law ‘On The Federal Budget for 2014 and the Planning Period of 2015 and 2016’, adopted by the State Duma on June 20, 2014, was published on July 3, 2014 on the Russian President’s website.

Prime Minister Dmitry Medvedev presented during a meeting of the Russian Government a forecast for economic growth rates in Russia in the next three years. In 2015 economic growth rate is expected to reach up 2% y-o-y and then accelerate up to 3% and beyond by 2017, said the Prime Minister.