US Dollar / Russian Ruble - USD/RUB

After the hyperinflation observed in Russia in the 90s and the repetitive financial crisis, even after the introduction of the new Ruble (RUB in 1998), the Russian banking system has become more reliable since 2005 and the fluctuations of the USD/RUB cross “normalized” on the Forex.

Structurally, the external value of the Russian Ruble seems to be strongly linked with the level of the world raw energy material (oil and gas in particular).

With the exchange value USD/RUB = 28 at the beginning of 2005, the USD/RUB cross remained stable until January 2006 (oscillating from USD/RUB = 28 to USD/RUB = 29), then a slow decrease movement happened: the appreciation of the Russian currency (as the other European currencies one, in particular the euro) in the context of the “weak dollar” monetary policy run in the United States.

The exchange value of the USD/RUB cross went under USD/RUB = 24 from February 2008 and we had a lower at USD/RUB = 23,0472 on July 15th, 2008.

In the context of the worsening of the world financial and stock-exchange crisis, the dollar fast re-appreciated against most of the other world currencies, and against the ruble this appreciation resulted in a +56% increase in few months: the cross was worth USD/RUB = 36 at the end of February 2009.

With the suspension of the decrease and the increase restarting of the oil rates, the Russian Ruble won ground against the US dollar in 2009, despite some bullish jolts which sometimes happened on several weeks.

On mid-January 2010, the exchange value was USD/RUB = 29,772, so a value next the one of the years 2005-2006.