Page 54 - bne IntelliNews Country Report: Russia Dec17

March 2018 more proposals can be expected to be tabled to increase taxation on personal income, the analysts warn.
Russia will make a final decision on combining the Federal Tax Service (FNS) and the Federal Customs Service (FTS) before May 2018 , Igor Shuvalov, first deputy prime minister told a meeting at FNS on November 20. Putting the two agencies under supervision of the finance ministry in early 2016 was a temporary decision, and the fate of FTS and FNS is yet to be decided. The combining of the two services has been discussed on an on-and-off basis for quite a while, and a step in that direction was made in 2016, when a joint IT system was rolled out. However, heads of FTS and FNS are apparently opposed to the idea, saying that the functions of the two agencies differ substantially.
Russian President Vladimir Putin signed a law on the introduction in Russia of a system for compensating value-added tax (VAT) for foreigners . Tax free will operate for non-residents of the country when they export goods purchased in Russia. The document was published on the official Internet portal of legal information. The corresponding article is included in the Tax Code. By virtue of this norm, as specified in the document, will enter a month after publication, on December 27. However, fully the system according to the law will begin its work not earlier than January 1, 2018, when the next tax period for VAT starts in Russia. Technically, the entire integration of document management, as noted in the document, should be completed only by October 1, 2018. By this time, according to the law, the exchange of documents between stores, as well as the Customs and Taxation Services, must become electronic. The Citizens of states that are not members of the Eurasian Economic Union (Armenia, Belarus, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan) will be eligible to use the tax free system. They will be able to count on compensation equal to the VAT amount of 18%, minus the tax free commission. At the same time, the purchase amount, as specified in the document, should not be less than 10 thousand rubles. including tax.
6.1.3 Budget dynamics - funding, privatization
6.1.4 Budget dynamics - non-oil deficit
Russia plans its first ever road show of yuan-denominated state treasury bills in China soon, the government says. The government will pitch its domestic OFZ treasury bonds denominated in yuan to Chinese investors as part of a strategy to diversify away from western funding sources in case financial sanctions are toughened, Reuters said on November 10 citing Deputy Finance Minister Sergei Storchak. In June Storchak said Russia had dropped plans to borrow in yuan , as this did not meet the conditions for issuing so-called panda bonds on China's domestic market.
OIl used to be the key factor in Russia’s budget income and since the prices collapsed at the end of 2014 the non-oil income has become more important.
OIl revenues have always made up about half of the Ministry of Finance budget revenues as percentage of GDP over the last decade. In absolute terms the amount of cash has risen steeply, but that has lifted the whole economy keeping the proportion in the revenues about the same. (2009 was an exception, when it fell to 40% after oil prices fell briefly to $35.)
54 RUSSIA Country Report December 2017 www.intellinews.com