Russia
Russian Federation
U.S. sanctions — Russia-related sanctions. Extensive blocking, sectoral, import/export, and price-cap measures.
As of August 2026 — verify with OFAC and screen counterparties with the xin.bz OFAC search.
- Region
- Europe · Eastern Europe
- Capital
- Moscow
- Population
- 143,513,328 (2025)
- Government
- semi-presidential federation
- Currency
- Russian ruble (RUB)
- Official languages
- Russian
- Spoken languages
- Russian (official) 85.7%, Tatar 3.2%, Chechen 1%, other 10.1% (2010 est.)
- Written scripts
- Cyrillic
- Area
- 17,098,242 km²
- Coastline
- Coastal
- UN member
- Yes
- Affiliations
- APEC, ASEAN (dialogue partner), BRICS, EAEU, G20, IMF, OIC (observer), SCO, WCO, WTO
- Borders
- Azerbaijan , Belarus , China , Estonia , Finland , Georgia , Kazakhstan , North Korea , Latvia , Lithuania , Mongolia , Norway , Poland , Ukraine
Political stability
50 / 100
Economic stability
33 / 100
Population stability
48 / 100
0–100, higher is more stable. Political: World Bank governance score. Economic: government effectiveness, regulatory quality, and inflation proximity to 2% (World Bank). Population: stability of growth and net migration rates (World Bank).
Trade profile
- Key exports
- crude petroleum, refined petroleum, natural gas, coal, fertilizers (2023)
- Key imports
- cars, packaged medicine, broadcasting equipment, garments, plastic products (2023)
- Natural resources
- wide natural-resource base including major deposits of oil, natural gas, coal, and many strategic minerals, bauxite, reserves of rare earth elements, timber
- Critical minerals
- Major palladium, nickel, and titanium supplier.
- Luxury goods
- caviar, diamonds (G7 import bans apply)
- Primary route
- Asian overland rail and Pacific ports (sanctions have rerouted westbound trade)
- Secondary route
- Northern Sea Route (seasonal) and Black Sea grain corridors
The xin.bz view
- Russia enters 2026–27 with potentially around 60M t of exportable grain, but Black Sea attacks, vessel risk, insurance constraints, and port damage limit how much of it is commercially accessible — the grain exists; its value depends on whether it can move.
- It is one of the world’s largest fertilizer exporters under quantitative export quotas, and refinery attacks have created a transport-fuel constraint: rerouting grain by rail and truck needs the diesel the refining system is struggling to supply.
- The Northern Sea Route is carrying growing oil volumes toward Asia, adding an Arctic corridor that avoids traditional maritime chokepoints.
xin.bz coverage
El Niño 2026–27: Where Supply Falls, Where It Rises, and Which Corridors Carry It
The 2026–27 El Niño is on track to be one of the strongest on record. A quarter-by-quarter outlook of where supply falls, where it rises, and which trade corridors absorb the change.
El Niño Hits China Differently: Beijing Can Move the Shock
China enters El Niño with grain reserves, oil inventories, huge ports, Belt and Road routes, and rare-earth leverage — its purchasing and inventory decisions decide where global disruption lands next.
El Niño Is Increasing the World's Need for Eurasia — Geopolitics Will Decide What Gets Through
Russia's ~60M t exportable grain, Kazakh wheat and uranium, Belarusian potash, Turkmen gas, and the Middle Corridor — El Niño raises the world's need for Eurasia while geopolitics decides what gets through.
El Niño Is Raising the Middle East's Food and Water Needs — While War Is Rewriting How Supply Gets In and Energy Gets Out
Gulf desalination and grain buying, Egypt's Nile and Suez loops, Hormuz fertilizer constraints, and $280B+ in reconstruction demand — the Middle East sits on both sides of the El Niño shock.
El Niño Is Arriving With Eastern Europe's Waterways Already Depleted — Just as the World Needs Its Grain Corridors
The Danube at exceptional lows, Ukrainian grain exports at a third of last year's pace, Polish maize stepping up, and $588B of reconstruction demand waiting to reverse the corridors — Eastern Europe's recharge season decides 2027.
El Niño Is Arriving as Western Europe Rebuilds Its Water Reserves — While Energy and Arctic Trade Reprice the Atlantic Economy
The Rhine recovering from record lows, England 71% in drought, French crops down hard, Qatar's LNG collapse pushing Europe to U.S. gas, and Iceland and Greenland turning the Atlantic into Western Europe's organizing system.
A New Sea Road to Europe: China and South Korea Move First on the Arctic Container Route
China and South Korea open commercial Arctic container service to Europe in 2026, Russia builds the icebreaker and port backbone, and Finland and Canada position for the shipbuilding and Northwest Passage phases ahead.
Zimbabwe's Antimony Export Restriction Turns Processing Capacity Into Strategic Power
Zimbabwe has placed antimony and tungsten behind a national gate, and the decisive contest is now over who finances the processing capacity — in a market where three countries mine 85% of world supply.
The Fuel Dock Becomes the Next Shipping Chokepoint
Large-vessel bunker constraints are moving from refinery systems into global freight economics — a 218,000 b/d fuel-oil deficit, 12–15-day Singapore lead times, and the routes, industries and carriers that pay first.
Commodity Deep Dive ·
Potash Is the Potassium Backbone of Global Agriculture — and Its Supply Is Concentrated in a Handful of Countries
Potash (potassium chloride/MOP) deep dive — Canada, Russia, China, and Belarus at 76% of mine output, the rail-and-port chokepoints, storage, price history, and why potassium is agriculture's irreplaceable nutrient.
Commodity Deep Dive ·
Fertilizer Converts Energy and Mined Minerals Into Crop Yield — and Its Supply Chain Has Become a Strategic Chokepoint
Fertilizer deep dive — 216M t of nutrients produced against 197M t used, nitrogen tied to natural gas, Hormuz choking a third of urea trade, and why N, P, and K are irreplaceable in plant nutrition.
Commodity Deep Dive ·
Copper Is the Metal Every Grid, Motor, and Data Center Runs On — and Half the World Refines It in One Country
Copper deep dive — 23 Mt of mine supply against 29 Mt of refining capacity, Chile at 23% of output, China at 48% of smelting, treatment charges at zero, and a record $14,858/t after Grasberg and El Teniente.
Commodity Deep Dive ·
LNG Is the Fuel That Freed Gas From the Pipeline — and Every Cargo Sails Past a Chokepoint Someone Can Close
LNG deep dive — 436.98 Mt of seaborne trade in 2025, the United States at 110.74 Mt, Qatar under force majeure since March 2026, JKM at $27.51/MMBtu, and roughly 80 Mt a year routed through the Strait of Hormuz.
Commodity Deep Dive ·
Wheat Is the Grain That Feeds a Fifth of Humanity's Calories — and a Quarter of Its Exports Leave Through One 700-Metre Channel
Wheat deep dive — 822.4 Mt of world production against 211.7 Mt of trade, China at 140.1 Mt, Russia exporting 43.0 Mt through the Turkish Straits, and CBOT nearby wheat at $7.26 a bushel.
Commodity Deep Dive ·
Antimony Is the Flame Retardant and Ammunition Metal That One Country Refines — and Licenses on Its Own Terms
Antimony deep dive — 110,000 t of world mine supply with China, Russia, and Tajikistan at 85.5%, Chinese smelters holding above 85% of refining capacity, dual-use export licensing, and metal at $51,800/t.
Future Insight ·
Rearming the World Is Becoming a Race for Explosives, Factories, Critical Minerals, and Trusted Supply Chains
Future Insights deep dive — the 2026–2032 global rearmament cycle: a ~2.6 million tonne military replacement obligation, and the industrial race in explosives, propellant, rare-earth magnets, and trusted supply chains.
Future Insight ·
Every Ship Is a Network: Maritime Cyber Risk From NotPetya to the 2027 Deadline
Future Insights — the maritime cyber record from GAO, Coast Guard Cyber Command, MARAD and ENISA: NotPetya at $250–300M and attributed to the GRU, GPS spoofing from a 2013 UT Austin experiment to 1,700 events at Hormuz, default credentials on two-thirds of Coast Guard missions, and the plans due July 2027.
Future Insight ·
Position, Weather, Signal: The Satellite Layers Global Logistics Runs On — and the Backup Ordered in 2018
Future Insights — logistics runs on three satellite layers, each with a documented failure: GPS spoofing, the July 2026 GOES-19 outage, and the Viasat and Starlink attacks. Congress ordered a GPS timing backup in 2018. The analog skills retired while the dependency grew.
Future Insight ·
Redundancy, Training and Old Physics: What Carries Logistics Through a Satellite Outage
Future Insights — the engineering answer to contested orbits: diversity of physics rather than more satellites. Holdover clocks measured in days, eLoran rebuilt in Britain and Korea, magnetic navigation flown for four hours without GPS, and the training that turns equipment into capability.
Future Insight ·
Two Programs, One Ridge: The Supply Chain That Decides the Moon Race, 2024–2036
Future Insights — the second Moon race as a logistics contest: $93 billion spent, more than 10 tanker flights per landing, and two programs aimed at the same sunlit ridge above a crater that has been dark for billions of years.
Trade research
- WTO trade profile — tariffs, trade in goods and services, top partners
- World Bank country data — GDP, trade share of GDP, logistics indicators
- OEC trade profile — export/import composition and partners, visualized
- ITC Trade Map — detailed trade statistics by product (ITC/UN Comtrade)
- CIA World Factbook — geography, economy, transportation infrastructure
xin.bz can watch Russia for you — email alerts when new disruptions hit. Start free
Sources: mledoze/countries (ODbL), CIA World Factbook (public domain), World Bank Open Data (CC BY-4.0), flag-icons (MIT). Stability scores are xin.bz composites of the cited World Bank indicators; routes and commodity notes are xin.bz assessments. Informational only — verify with official sources.