... on oil prices and currency exchange rates) is rising, pulling internal prices along, especially with a weakened dampener. Concurrently, high oil prices sustain the revenues of oil companies, partly compensating for their limitations in the domestic fuel market. Gas. The natural gas market follows its own trends. European gas prices stabilized in 2025 after crisis peaks in 2022, and domestic Russian prices remain comparatively low for end consumers due to state regulation. Therefore, the increase in gasoline prices is not directly connected to gas prices. However, gas plays a role as an alternative energy ...

... Meanwhile, the summer holiday and travel season supports elevated consumption of gasoline and jet fuel in major economies, further fueling oil demand. Geopolitical risks and sanctions. The U.S. administration is ramping up pressure on Moscow. At the end of ... ... current levels are still 10–15% lower than a year ago – reflecting corrections following the peaks of the 2022–2023 energy crisis. Investors continue to monitor external signals: U.S.-China negotiations over trade disputes are ongoing, and the U.S. ...

... taxes, employee salaries, and spend money on maintaining operations. The damping mechanism has been in place in the Russian fuel market since 2019. In its entire history, it was only nullified once, in September last year, during the height of the fuel crisis. At that time, the rules for payments to oil companies were changed, with a coefficient of 0.5 (instead of 1) reducing the compensation by half. Fuel prices rose and exceeded the threshold values. In October, the previous rules with a coefficient ...

... since June, only correcting downward in the 20s of the current month. Moreover, on July 24, AI-95 reached its highest price of the year, reaching 75,296 rubles per ton, close to the historical record of 76,876 rubles per ton set last autumn during the fuel crisis. Following the wholesale price growth, retail prices also accelerated. In June, weekly gasoline price growth averaged 0.2-0.4% across Russia, while in July it was 0.5-0.6%, according to Rosstat data. By July 22, gasoline prices had increased ...

... supply volumes of AI-95 to the domestic market. There may also be attempts to reduce dampener payments in case of falling oil prices and declining budget revenues from the sector. The last attempt to reduce the dampener by half in 2023 led to an autumn fuel crisis. Kotov notes that the Ministry of Finance has repeatedly attempted to change the dampener mechanism to reduce payments. It is likely that the new mechanism will again focus on this goal (though officially, the aim is said to be the additional ...