Foreign experts recognized Russia's success in reducing its dependence on the dollar. There has been a gradual decline in the share of ordinary Russians’ savings in the dollars. As for the de-dollarization of the Russian economy in general, the efforts of the authorities directed towards the phasing out of the dollar in trade settlements have paid off, with first results already visible.
The study of the Wall Street Journal is based on the data on the share of physical and legal entities’ deposits in foreign currencies in Russian banks, according to which total deposits have reduced markedly. Currently, the share of deposits amounts to 26 percent, while it was 37 percent two years ago. The large-scale abandonment of the dollar is due simply to the fact that citizens want to protect their savings. Accordingly, concerned by potential losses, they massively withdraw funds from foreign currency accounts. The massive closing of foreign currency deposits is presented as another success of the de-dollarization policy, supported by the Russian President.
Moreover, there are real steps taken toward achieving it. One of them is the use of national currencies for settlements with China. According to the publication, the bilateral trade in rubles and yuan within four years has increased almost four times, to 19 percent. As for the details on the policy, Russian deputy finance minister Alexey Moiseev said that the government would not disclose its plan to de-dollarize the economy, and added: “The plan is for official use only.” Besides, he stated that the project on Russia’s abandonment of the dollar gave rise to some technical disagreements between the Ministry of Finance, the Ministry of Economic Development, and the Central Bank, but the differences would be overcome soon.
