Limit on exporting cash rubles from Russia to EAEU reduced from $100,000 to 1 mln rubles, extended to 3 CIS countries
MOSCOW. Sept 29 (Interfax) - The restriction on the export of cash rubles from Russia to the countries of the Eurasian Economic Union (EAEU), introduced on April 1, has been extended to Azerbaijan, Uzbekistan and Tajikistan, and the limit for individuals has been reduced from $100,000 to 1 million rubles, with the exception of a number of cases.
The corresponding decree, signed by President Vladimir Putin, was published on the official online portal of legal information.
Legal entities and individual entrepreneurs are prohibited from exporting cash currency to these countries regardless of the amount.
Exceptions for legal entities and individuals include the export of currency through Russian international airports designated by the government, if there are bank statements certified by the credit organization that issued them and confirming the withdrawal of Russian rubles from bank accounts/deposits of individuals, legal entities and individual entrepreneurs exporting the currency, or if there are other documents, the list of which will be established by the Russian government.
Another exception is the export by legal entities of cash currency as part of international transportation, in which the point of departure and the point of destination are located outside Russia, subject to confirmation of the occurrence of importing such currency into the country.
The restriction does not apply to the export of cash currency if it is carried out on the basis of a notification issued by the Russian Foreign Ministry, for the purpose of ensuring the activities of diplomatic missions, consular offices, representations of the Russian Federation at international (interstate, intergovernmental) organizations, and foreign offices of federal executive bodies.
According to the document, in case of violation of the ban, cash currency is subject to seizure from individuals in the amount exceeding 1 million rubles, and from legal entities and individual entrepreneurs in full.
The decree instructs the government, in agreement with the Central Bank of Russia, to approve within a three-month period the procedure for accounting for cash rubles exported from Russia.
The presidential decree published on Tuesday amends decree no. 193, which since April 1 prohibited individuals from exporting rubles equivalent to upwards of $100,000 at the Central Bank rate on the current date to EAEU countries. Legal entities and individual entrepreneurs could not, from that date, export currency regardless of the amount. The decree also in general cases prohibits individuals since May from exporting gold bars with a total weight of more than 100 g from Russia. The restrictions presuppose exceptions in a number of cases.
Earlier in September, the head of the Central Bank's financial monitoring and currency control service, Bogdan Shablya, said that practice requires the tightening of decree no. 193.
The director of the Finance Ministry's Financial Policy Department, Alexei Yakovlev, also spoke about the existence of abuses in this area. "We encounter the fact that the documents that are provided cannot always be fully identified. Accordingly, there are instances of abuse in those cases that we see from the point of view that certain documents; attempts are made to use the same documents for the export of, so to speak, several batches of funds," he said.
