Page 42 - RusRPTAug19

5.0 External Sector & Trade 5.1 External sector overview
Russia’s trade in goods hit 457.6bn in May, which is on a par with last year’s result. Trade turnover remains largely stable and very similar to the 2018 profile.
At the same time, thank to the raw materials exports Russia continues to run a comfortable trade surplus that has been running at over $15bn a month almost all year.
According to Bank of Russia’s estimate, the surplus in the current account of the balance of payments of the Russian Federation in January–May 2019 totaled $48.7 billion, growing by $1.8 billion on the comparable outcome of 2018. Improving balance on trade in services due to the exports of services growth whilst the imports thereof declined together with the strengthening of the trade balance had a positive effect of the aggregate’s dynamics.
42 RUSSIA Country Report August 2019 www.intellinews.com