Russia cuts 2025 economic growth forecast from 2.5% to 1.5%
Russia's Finance Minister Anton Siluanov told Russian President Vladimir Putin on Aug. 27 that the country has lowered its annual economic growth forecast for 2025 from 2.5% to 1.5%, as the country's wartime economy continues to falter.
"If this year we see rather tough conditions for the implementation of monetary and credit policy, we see that the rate of economic growth will nevertheless be no less than 1.5 percent this year, at least according to the assessment of the Economy Ministry," Siluanov told Putin, Reuters reported.
The implementation of Western sanction, as well as increased military spending at the expense of civilian investment and private consumption, have primarily led to a deteriorating economic situation in Russia, driving inflation and stifling borrowing amid the country's near record-high interest rates.
Central Bank Governor Elvira Nabiullina warned in June that the economy had reached "the edge of capacity," while Economy Minister Maxim Reshetnikov said the country was "on the verge of a transition to recession."
The steep decline in the projection follows two years of high economic growth, with Russia's wartime economy surging after the start of the full-scale invasion in February 2022. Russia's economy grew from 4.1% in 2023 to 4.3% in 2024, before facing a significant drop off.
The Russian economy expanded by just 1.4% in the first quarter of 2025, a third of the pace seen in 2024. According to a report released on Aug. 6, Russia's Central Bank is forecasting near-zero GDP expansion by the end of 2025, expecting a slowdown to 1.6% in the third quarter, and between 0-1% in the final months of the year.
The projection follows a broader downgrade from the International Monetary Fund, which cut its 2025 growth estimate for Russia to 0.9%. Growth is expected to remain sluggish at 1% in 2026 — the steepest downgrade among major economies in the IMF's latest global outlook.
As peace talks continue to play out, European allies have urged the United States to implement additional economic pressure on Moscow to force Putin to the negotiation table.
U.S. President Donald Trump warned on Aug. 26 that the U.S. could potentially launch "an economic war" that would be "bad for Russia" if it failed to negotiation an end of the war. Trump has previously threatened to implement additional sanction on countries that buy Russian oil, although he has yet to do so at a large scale.
