The main share of Russian banking sector’s total assets falls at state-controlled banks (40.6%) and large private banks (34.6%) on January, 1, 2009.

According to aggregative balance sheet, profit of 30 largest Russian banks totaled RUR949.181 billion (including financial results of the previous year) on April, 1, 2009. Among them profit in 2009 amounted to RUR39.683 billion.

The National Agency for Financial Studies (NAFI) announced ratings of Russian banks’ publicity (spontaneous awareness) and awareness (prompted awareness).

Turnover of cards issued by Russian banks totaled RUR2.069 trillion in Q1, 2009.

National Bank of Ukraine (NBU) announced the main trend of payment systems’ development in the country.

The bill introduced to State Duma, which forbids banks to ratchet upward interest rates for already granted credits, Russian government found non-market one. Currently financial institution has a right to change cost of loan if it is prescribed in bank’s agreement with borrower.

A cyber-crime battle has broken out across business networks nationwide, and it's not just enterprises in the line of fire. A study by Verizon Communications released in April found that one third of all 2008 data breaches came at the expense of businesses with 100 employees or less.

One of the results of a seminar organized by INPAS International in Budapest, Hungary, came out an arrangement between OTP bank, MasterCard and INPAS International to start a pilot project on contactless payments in Hungary.

Ukrainian banks reduced total volume of granted credits both for individuals and corporate clients. The main reason of negative dynamics is absence of trust to the government.

Central Bank of the Russian Federation reports that money supply M2 (national definition), without regard to deposits in foreign currency,in Russia reduced by 10.2% in Q1, 2009, from RUR13.493 trillion on January, 1, 2009, to RUR12.111 trillion on April, 1, 2009.

Reduction of retail crediting volumes of Russian banks continued in March, 2009. Calculations took into account 32 Russian financial institutions among 50 largest banks of the country, including Sberbank of the Russian Federation.

In frameworks of united conference “Russian Internet Forum + Conference “Internet and Business” which was held from 22 to 24 of April, 2009, a section “E-Travel: specifics of tourist products’ and tickets’ sales in Russia” took place. Organizers of the section were international processing company ChronoPay and project OZON-Travel.

Rory MacFarquhar, analyst of Goldman Sachs in Moscow, called Bank of Russia’s decision about cutting base refinance rate (see Bank of Russia Cuts Refinance Rate from 13% to 12.5%) “unpleasant episode which chases away any appearance of Russian Central Bank’s independence”.

The National Agency for Financial Studies (NAFI) announced results of the research about Russians’ summing-up of the current situation for housing purchasing and estimates of housing prices’ dynamics and mortgage rates. 1600 respondents in 140 inhabited localities of 42 Russian regions took part in the research.

Bank of Russia’s board of the directors decided to reduce rates on some Bank’s operations. With effect from April, 24, 2009, refinance rate of Bank of Russia was fixed as 12.5%.

Vladimir Putin, Russian Prime Minister, spoke to the delegates of All-Russia Forum for Small and Medium Business.

Profi Online Research announced results of the research conducted jointly with Qualitel Data Services in the largest Russian cities on February, 2009.

According to Polish research company PMR, the volume of Russian IТ market which is the largest in Central and Eastern Europe will reduce by 14.2% in 2009 compared with 2008 and dropped to RUR462.3 billion.

According to Russian Deposit Insurance Agency (DIA), Russian banks got out of rouble devaluation about RUR800 or RUR900 billion from November, 2008, to January, 2009.

German Gref, Chairman of the Board of Sberbank of Russia, supposes that the peak of crisis is behind. “Currently there won’t be growth stage, but there will be certain stabilization which we can see during March and April”, – Mr. Gref said.