In today’s Vatnik Soup REBREW, I’ll introduce a bank that is well-known in both Austria and Russia: Raiffeisen Bank International (RBI) and its Russian subsidiary, AO Raiffeisen. It is one of the few foreign banks that still does business in Russia.

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Raiffeisen’s Russian branch was founded in 1996 and expanded dramatically after the acquisition of Russia’s Impexbank in 2006. A year later, it was the largest bank trading in foreign capital (seventh in size) in Russia.

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In the early 2000s, Raiffeisen opened new branches in Russia, including in Saint Petersburg, Samara, Yekaterinburg, Novosibirsk and Krasnodar. After 2018, it focused on digital expansion and by 2021 it had a digital presence in more than 300 cities.

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RBI’s core values sound good: collaboration, pro-activity, learning and responsibility. But both collaboration and responsibility have a double meaning. By doing intensive business with Russia, RBI enriches itself at the expense of the people murdered by Russia in Ukraine.

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Raiffeisen’s management sees no problem in recognising and doing business with the Luhansk People’s Republic and the Donetsk People’s Republic, terrorist organisations rather than states, as is evident from its own message from January 2023.

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https://x.com/OstanniyCap/status/1612359550056943618

According to the Austrian newspaper “Die Presse”, Russia’s financial system depends on the presence of the Western bank in Russia. Enabling Putin’s mafia regime to continue making financial transactions with the West makes Raiffeisen Bank complicit in genocide.

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Customer satisfaction in Russia at Raiffeisen is high: In 2021, the American Forbes named the bank the “best bank in Russia” and in 2018, Euromoney magazine called the bank “the best bank for private banking services for wealthy clients in Central and Eastern Europe”.

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After the large-scale invasion of Ukraine by Russia in February 2022, many Western companies and banks decided to leave the Russian market. In general, a mass departure of banks from a country can have devastating consequences for the economy.

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That is why Putin has done everything he can to disrupt any departures. Nowadays, all major departures must be signed off by the Tsar himself. Many Western banks left Russia as early as 2014, after the annexation of Crimea.

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But some European banks, including Raiffeisen and the Italian Unicredit, saw an opportunity to make easy money and decided to stay. For Raiffeisen, it has indeed turned out to be a profitable deal to stay in Russia and continue business as usual: around 60% of its profits…
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…totaling EUR 2 billion, came from Russia. That this profiteering is ongoing is evident from the fact that in the first 6 months of 2024, AO Raiffeisen still accounts for 50% of RBI’s total profit, according to Raiffeisen itself.

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The bank has over €4,5 billion in outstanding loans through 121 offices and €30 million in assets in Russia (status: 2023). But Raiffeisen’s stay in Russia has had its challenges. Russia began granting deferrals on loans to its troops fighting in Ukraine last year.

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Banks must cancel loans if soldiers are maimed or killed. Between Sep and December 2022 alone, the write-offs were worth €800 million. By providing these loans, both Raiffeisen and Unicredit are funding Russia’s brutal war machine.

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International criticism has consistently targeted RBI. In January 2023, the US Treasury Department launched an investigation into possible violations of Western sanctions. Also, the European Central Bank has pressured Raiffeisen to leave the lucrative Russian market.

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On the 30 March 2023, Raiffeisen called its critics “morally arrogant” and moralising from a “risk-free comfort zone.” It is worth noting that one of Raiffeisen’s staunchest critics is President Zelenskyy, who hardly operates from a “risk-free comfort zone.”

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In 2024, the RBI was forced to back down. A deal worth $1,5 billion to buy shares in the construction company Strabag AG from sanctioned Russian oligarch Oleg Deripaska left the bank under threat of crippling sanctions from the US. The deal got called off.

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The European Central Bank has also pressured RBI to scale back its activities in Russia, reflecting a broader Western regulatory push to further isolate Russia financially. But in November 2024, the bank announced that it would even now not leave Russia.

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It’s still lucrative to do business with Putin. RBI’s share price has risen sharply after Trump’s election, in the hope that Russian sanctions will be eased. Over 60% of Raiffeisen is owned by Raiffeisen’s 1,7 million Austrian members & nearly 40% by free floating shares.

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In March 2025, OCCRP & Der Standard reported that between Jan-Feb of 2022, RBI sent over €9 billion in cash to Moscow, providing a massive liquidity boost to the Russian economy. While Russian tanks were rolling towards Kyiv, at least ten cash shipments reached Moscow.

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In April 2025, Financial Times reported that RBI has halted the sale of their Russia unit due to Trump administration’s new friendship with the Kremlin. An RBI spokesperson later commented that “the sale process is continuing,” denying the rumours.

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In conclusion: it seems that Raiffeisen’s shareholders and members consider profit more important than the lives of Ukrainians. But they’re also under pressure — in March 2025, Austrian activists protested against RBI, demanding they stop doing business with Russia.

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The 2nd edition of “Vatnik Soup — The Ultimate Guide to Russian Disinformation” is officially out!

You can order your copy here:

kleart.eu/webshop/p/vatn…