No windfall tax decisions yet, tax adjustments may be discussed during budgeting - dep Russian finance minister
MOSCOW. May 27 (Interfax) - The Russian government is not yet discussing the need for a windfall tax - any decisions on possible tax adjustments will be made when the federal budget for 2027-2029 is being drafted, Deputy Finance Minister Alexei Sazanov said.
"There are no such discussions at present. Again, when discussing the budget for the next three years, 2027-2029, all federal budget revenues and expenditures will be considered as a whole, and a decision will be based on our needs. There have been no decisions on a windfall tax yet, this is not currently being discussed," he told reporters.
"We need to establish an expenditure base for the next three years, assess revenues, and, decisions will be reached on the necessary tax adjustments, if such a need arises, going by the Economic Development Ministry's macroeconomic forecasts," he said.
Sazanov said earlier that the necessity and possibility of a windfall tax would be assessed as part of the entire set of issues when preparing the draft federal budget for the next three-year period. A substantive discussion will take place in the summer, and a bill, if required, could be introduced as early as autumn as part of the budget package.
A windfall profit tax was discussed publicly in late March. When the State Duma reviewed the Central Bank of Russia's report on March 26, a member of the lower house raised the issue of imposing an additional natural resource levy in a number of sectors in light of rising prices to support the budget. Economic Development Minister Maxim Reshetnikov said in response that this issue could be discussed, but linked it to the investment cycle of companies in these sectors.
An order from the president dated March 10 instructs relevant agencies to work out proposals by April 10 to impose a windfall tax of 20% for 2025, a source familiar with the discussions told Interfax later. The source said the authorities are considering exacting the tax on the amount by which profits companies earned in 2025 exceeded the average profit in 2018-2019.
Asked whether the government could indeed abandon the further reduction of the VAT exemption threshold for small businesses in 2027, keeping it at 20 million rubles, as discussed by Alexander Shokhin, head of the Russian Union of Industrialists and Entrepreneurs (RSPP), Sazavov said: "Any discussions will take place in August-September during the preparation of the budget package."
The income threshold for simplified tax system (STS) taxpayers to pay VAT has been reduce d gradually since January 1, 2026. In 2025, entrepreneurs using STS whose revenue exceeded 60 million rubles either in the previous year or as of January 1, 2025, were required to pay VAT. The threshold was lowered to 20 million rubles this year. It is expected to drop to 15 million rubles in 2027 and to 10 million rubles in 2028.
