As things stand, around 21,800 Russians now have assets in excess of one million dollars, with the common value of their capital increasing 62% in the last year.

This means that the number of the country’s dollar millionaires is now higher than in 2022 (14,600), and tops 2021’s pre-war figure of 18,500. Those with capital exceeding five million dollars has also jumped to 4,100. This was up from 2,500 in 2022 and 3,500 in 2021.

Lyubov Prokopova of Russian financial portal Frank RG said: “In 2023 (...) the most important driver of the growth of financial capital of customers (with capital of USD 1 million or more) in Russia was the inflow of ‘new money’ which was mainly due to the reduction of capital outflow from Russia.”

Citing Bloomberg data, Eurasianet also reported that the number of Russian dollar billionaires, as well as the total value of their capital, also rose.

According to analysts, this was directly related to Kremlin cronies profiting from the war with Ukraine.