In 2023, Western banks paid four times more taxes in Russia than before the war

Western banks paid 800 million euros in taxes in Russia for the year 2023, which is four times more than in the pre-war year of 2021.

This information reported according to the Financial Times.

Partially, this increase was due to funds that banks cannot withdraw from the country. More than half of this amount was paid by Raiffeisen, the largest foreign bank in Russia.

The seven largest European banks by assets in Russia – Raiffeisen Bank International, UniCredit, ING, Commerzbank, Deutsche Bank, Intesa Sanpaolo and OTP – reported a combined profit of over 3 billion euros in 2023.

The surge in profitability led to an increase in taxes paid, including by American creditors such as Citigroup and JPMorgan.

“Foreign creditors have benefited not only from higher interest rates but also from international sanctions against Russian banks. Such measures have deprived their competitors of access to international payment systems and increased the attractiveness of Western banks to clients in the country,” FT writes.

Earlier, it was reported that the United Kingdom was importing record volumes of oil products from Russia.

At the same time, European Union countries purchased Russian oil, gas and oil products worth 29 billion euros in 2023, according to the statistical representation of the European Union on its website.