Russia’s Finance Ministry will acquire 265.8 billion rubles of foreign currency from the open market under the budget rule from January 15 through February 6, spending 15.6 billion rubles a day, the authority said in a statement.
Under the rule, windfall oil and gas income of the budget from the oil price of above $40 per barrel are earmarked to buy currency on the domestic market. The ministry added that in January, the income is projected at 220.6 billion rubles, PRIME reported.
In February 2017, the ministry entered the currency market to minimize dependence of the ruble rate on oil prices. In September 2018, the central bank decided to suspend foreign currency purchases on the market for the Finance Ministry to reduce volatility on financial markets.
