Russian Finance Ministry plans to allocate 110.3 bln rubles to buy currency, gold on May 8 to June 4 at 5.8 bln rubles per day

MOSCOW. May 6 (Interfax) - Russia's Finance Ministry is resuming domestic market operations under the budget rule after a two-month hiatus as of May 8 to June 4 to purchase foreign currency and gold totaling 110.3 billion rubles, with daily transactions amounting to the equivalent of 5.8 billion rubles, the ministry said.

The total amount of funds allocated for the purchase of foreign currency and gold includes additional oil and gas revenues to the federal budget in May, plus the volume of deferred transactions for March and April.

The Finance Ministry last purchased foreign currency and gold in June of last year, when the total transaction volume was 28.3 billion rubles, with daily transactions of 1.5 billion rubles.

The Finance Ministry in March and April of this year did not conduct any operations under the fiscal rule, citing planned changes to the base oil price. The Finance Ministry in January and February sold currency and gold totaling 192.1 billion rubles, or 12.8 billion rubles per day a record of daily sales volume in the history of such operations and 226.8 billion rubles at 11.9 billion rubles, respectively.

The Central Bank plans to purchase or sell foreign currency in the first half of 2026 based on an adjustment to the Finance Ministry's announced volume of fiscal rule operations by a daily sales volume of 4.62 billion rubles.

Therefore, taking into account the Finance Ministry's announced transaction volumes, the Bank of Russia will switch to foreign currency purchases, purchasing 1.18 billion rubles per day from May 8, 2026, to June 4, 2026.