Survey of Current Business (April-July 2018)

Sergey Aukutsionek – Head of Center for Transition Economy Studies, Primakov National Research Institute of World Economy and International Relations, Russian Academy of Sciences, Candidate of Economic Sciences. E-mail: This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it.

Andrey Yegorov – Research fellow of the Center for Transition Economy Studies, Primakov National Research Institute of World Economy and International Relations, Russian Academy of Sciences, Candidate of Economic Sciences. E-mail: This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it.

Inessa Bachirova – Senior Research fellow of the Center for Transition Economy Studies, Primakov National Research Institute of World Economy and International Relations, Russian Academy of Sciences. E-mail: This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it.

Tatyana Serzhantova – Senior Research fellow of the Center for Transition Economy Studies, Primakov National Research Institute of World Economy and International Relations, Russian Academy of Sciences. E-mail: This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it.

In April 2018, due to a noticeable increase in the share of enterprises reporting a decline in output prices, the diffusion index of output prices markedly dropped (-17 points), reaching the minimum for the entire history of REB’s observations since 1991 – 37, which is 2 points less than the previous minimum value, fixed in December 2008. The value of the index of expected in 3 months changes of output prices also significantly decreased (-16 points); It was smaller only once – in the third quarter of 1998.

The capacity utilization rate decreased significantly, there was a noticeable reduction in stocks of finished products (relative to the normal level) and of the share of financially sound enterprises.

Key words: industry, industrial enterprises, price level, wages, employment, output, investment, indebtedness to banks, order-book level, stocks of finished products, capacity utilization rate, risk of bankruptcy, economic policy, crisis duration.