Capital outflows from the Russian economy during the quarter-century of Vladimir Putin's rule have exceeded the country's annual GDP. This is evidenced by calculations from Russia's Center for Macroeconomic Analysis and Short-Term Forecasting, reported by The Moscow Times and written by UNN.
Details
According to the center's estimates, during 2001–2025, cumulative capital outflows from the real sector exceeded 110% of GDP, while outflows from the economy as a whole amounted to 130% of GDP. Over the past 10 years, the real sector lost an average of about 3% of GDP annually.
The record year was 2022, when more than 12% of GDP left the country amid the withdrawal of Western companies and mass emigration following the start of the full-scale war against Ukraine. Russia also lost more than 10% of GDP through capital outflows in 2014, after the annexation of Crimea and the introduction of the first wave of Western sanctions.
More than $1 trillion may have already been taken out of Russia
After the start of the full-scale war, the Central Bank of the Russian Federation classified statistics on capital outflows by the private sector. However, its previous data indicate that in 2001–2021 alone, cumulative outflows amounted to $780.8 billion.
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Over 27 years—from 1994 to 2021—$907.4 billion was taken out of Russia. The Moscow Times estimates that, by now, the total amount has likely exceeded $1 trillion.
Experts call capital outflows from Russia chronic and note that their scale significantly exceeds the figures for many countries with comparable income levels. To reduce the outflows, they propose, in particular, taxing the foreign assets of Russian companies and carrying out an amnesty for capital previously taken out of the country.
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