Russian federal budget deficit 4.19 trillion rubles or 1.9% of forecast GDP in 8M, surplus seen in Aug

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Russian federal budget deficit 4.19 trillion rubles or 1.9% of forecast GDP in 8M, surplus seen in Aug

MOSCOW. Sept 9 (Interfax) - The Russian federal budget had a January-August 2025 deficit of 4.193 trillion rubles or 1.9% of GDP according to preliminary estimates, the Finance Ministry said in a monthly brief.

The 8M deficit was still more than the forecast deficit for the year, despite narrowing somewhat compared with January-July.

The planned federal budget deficit for the year was originally 1.173 trillion rubles or 0.5% of GDP but adopted spring amendments to the budget increased the planned deficit to 3.792 trillion rubles or 1.7% of GDP.

A source familiar with budgeting for the next three-year period said later there could be a deficit of more than 1.7% of GDP this year.

There was a deficit of 4.879 trillion rubles or 2.2% of GDP for January-July, according to preliminary MinFin data. There was a deficit of around 686 billion rubles for August, going by these data.

The Federal Treasury said there was a federal budget deficit of 4.622 trillion rubles for 7M 2025, so on that basis there could have been a surplus of around 430 billion rubles in August.

The deficit is mainly due to the advanced financing of expenditures in January, as well as a drop in oil and gas revenues, the MinFin said.

Federal budget revenue grew 3% year-on-year to 23.727 trillion rubles in 8M 2025.

Non-oil revenue grew 14.3% in 8M 2025 to 17.7 trillion rubles. Sales tax revenue including VAT rose 6%, consistent, the ministry said, with tendencies for internal demand to cool and inflation. VAT revenue grew 6%, to 8.972 trillion rubles.

Oil and gas revenue fell 20.2% year-on-year to 6.027 trillion rubles in 8M, principally due to a fall in the average oil price. Oil and gas revenue is higher than the base level of 5.837 trillion rubles, but is still at risk of decreasing due to weaker price environment, the Finance Ministry said.

Budget expenditure grew 21.1% to 27.92 trillion rubles in 8M. In general, in 2025, expenditures are aligning with the maximum budgetary allocations approved in the budget law, the MinFin said.

The spring amendments approved budget revenue at 38.506 trillion rubles and expenditure at 42.299 trillion rubles for the year.