Putin’s Big Dollar Dump Cost Russia $8 Billion in One Year

The first year of President Vladimir Putin’s experiment in diversifying away from the U.S. dollar cost Russia about $7.7 billion in potential returns.Russia’s central bank added exposure to underperforming currencies such as the euro and yuan just as it missed out on a 6.5% rally in the greenback. If it had maintained the previous dollar-heavy structure of it $531 billion reserves, gains for the year through March would have totaled around 3.8%, according to Bloomberg calculations.“This is the economic cost of addressing geopolitical concerns,” said Elina Ribakova, deputy chief economist at the Institute of International Economics in Washington. “It’s hard to judge yet if it was worth it. There was a cost this year, but it’s a long-term investment.”