Boston, MA -- (SBWIRE) -- 09/05/2013 -- The Russian Retail Report examines the long-term potential of the local consumer market but flags shortterm concerns about the impact on Russia's economic outlook of the stark shift by the central bank towards monetary policy tightening.

The report examines how best to maximise returns in the Russian retail market while minimising investment risk, and also explores the impact of the risk of a more precipitous fall in global energy prices (prompted by persistent weakness in the global economy) on the Russian consumer and on the ability of producers and exporters to realise returns in the short term. The report also analyses the growth and risk management strategies being employed by the leading players in the Russian retail sector as they seek to maximise the growth opportunities offered by the local market.

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Russian per capita consumer spending is forecast to increase by 49% to 2017, compared with a regional growth average of 37%. Russia comes second (out of 10) in BMI's Central and Eastern Europe Retail Risk/ Reward ratings.

Among all retail categories, mass grocery retail (MGR) will be the outperformer through to 2017 in growth terms, with sales forecast to grow by 201% compared with 55.8% for overall food sales. MGR is predicted to expand its share of the total food market to 81.2% by 2017, when value sales should reach US$305.51bn. In the competitive arena, BMI sees upside potential in the fact that the Russian government has committed to spending billions on infrastructure over the next 10 years, particularly railroads and highways, which should translate to better logistics for expanding retailers.

Over the last quarter, BMI has revised the following forecasts/views:

- BMI has downgraded its view for Russia's economic growth, from 3.4% to 2.6% in real GDP terms in 2013, as consumer spending slows and the global oil price falls from 2012 levels. However, we hold a cautiously optimistic view towards Russia's investment outlook ahead of a number of international sporting events and a drive to increase investment into the Far East of the country.
- We forecast private spending to slow to 4.0% in 2013 from an estimated 6.8% year-on-year (y-o-y) in 2012. The unemployment rate has started to tick higher, rising to 5.4% in November from 5.3% the previous month. Moreover, credit growth has slowed from 27.3% y-o-y back in May and June to 23.6% in October, according to central bank data.
- Slowing private consumption is also evident in retail sales growth, which fell to 4.4% y-o-y in November from 7.3% in the first half of 2012. Falling growth in real wages and disposable income further underpins our expectations that the slowdown in private consumption will persist throughout 2013. As a result, we forecast the contribution to real GDP growth of this component to fall to 2.2 percentage points (pp) from 3.4pp in the period Q112-Q312.

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