Western banks paid 800 million euros in taxes in Russia for 2023 – this is four…

🇪🇺🇷🇺 Western banks paid 800 million euros in taxes in Russia for 2023 – this is four times more than in pre-war 2021.

The Financial Times reports this.

The seven largest European banks by assets in Russia – Raiffeisen Bank International, UniCredit, ING, Commerzbank, Deutsche Bank, Intesa Sanpaolo and OTP – reported combined profits of more than €3 billion in 2023.

This is three times more than in 2021. It is partly obtained from funds that banks cannot withdraw from the country. More than half was paid by Raiffeisen, the largest foreign bank in the Russian Federation.

The jump in profitability led to an increase in taxes paid. In addition to profits from US lenders such as Citigroup and JPMorgan.

“Foreign lenders benefited not only from higher interest rates, but also from international sanctions against Russian banks. Such measures deprived their competitors of access to international payment systems and increased the attractiveness of Western banks for clients in the country,” writes the FT.