Cash in circulation in Russia surged in the third quarter of 2025: from July to September, its volume grew by 659 bln rubles – almost five times the increase recorded a year earlier, the Izvestiya newspaper reported.
According to the Central Bank, this is one of the most significant spikes that have occurred since 2022. While banks themselves are not seeing unusually high ATM withdrawals, they note that the cash people typically take out during the summer holiday season has not been redeposited this fall.
Market participants point to several reasons for the shift. One is the rise in mobile internet disruptions over the summer and fall, prompting many citizens to keep cash on hand “in case cashless payments fail.” Another factor is stricter scrutiny of suspicious transactions and withdrawals introduced on September 1, along with targeted inspections by the Federal Taxation Service since July. As a result, some individuals may be relying more heavily on cash to avoid blocks or delays. With the New Year season approaching, cash turnover could increase by an additional 300–400 billion rubles. Under the baseline outlook, however, once communications stabilize and people adapt to the updated rules, this cash is expected to gradually return to bank accounts.
Experts warn that the trend carries risks: a pronounced move toward cash shrinks banks’ resource base, creating conditions for the expansion of shadow transactions. It is unclear how far the shift will go, but if it persists, economists caution that certain business practices may drift back toward the more ‘manual’ and opaque approaches reminiscent of the 1990s.
“I don’t believe we’re headed for a return to the 1990s, when cash was overwhelmingly preferred by consumers,” notes Prof. Artem Genkin, President of the NPO Center for Protection of Bank Clients and Investors. “The major factors that drove distrust of non-cash payments back then are basically absent today. Chief among them was the high interest rate environment, which motivated banks to ‘rotate’ client funds, causing delays in cashless transactions compared with the instantaneous nature of cash exchanges. Now, many cashless payment options offer the same immediacy to both parties, making them fully competitive with cash.”