Last year, the Russian central bank more than doubled interest rates to tame prices. Inflation, though, kept rising, hitting over 9% this month, with a vast range of goods and services becoming costlier from potatoes (up 91% so far this year) to economy-class flights (up 35%).
The central bank lifted its benchmark rate another two percentage points on Friday to 18%, making it one of the few central banks in the world to raise rates this year.
Inflation has become a hard-to-shake feature of Russia’s war economy. Even as price rises have moderated across much of the developed world, Russia’s struggles with price stability are getting worse.
A surge in military spending by the government and a record labor shortage as working-age men go to the front or flee have fueled wages and pushed up prices. Fresh rounds of U.S. sanctions, meanwhile, have complicated international payments, further driving up costs for importers.
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