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economist at Alfa Bank said to Bloomberg. “It allowed them to distract attention from the announcement on halting the FX purchases and to create the impression that the central bank is regulating the economy with the help of interest rates.”
At the press conference following September's interest rate decision Nabiullina commented that it was excess ruble volatility, not any target ruble rate that the regulator is after. "Once we estimate that the volatility on our markets is down, no matter at what ruble exchange rate it will be, we [the CBR] don't care about the specific rate, we will resume regular currency purchases," she said.
59 RUSSIA Country Report December 2018 www.intellinews.com