When talking about Russia's economic affairs over the years, I can't get rid of the key figure around Putin, Elvira Nabiulina. She is the head of the Russian Central Bank. She has been holding this position since 2013 and helping the country tide over difficulties again and again.
With wave after wave of Western sanctions, the Russian economy did not collapse, but stabilized its foothold. She contributed a lot to this. Without her solid policy adjustments, Russia under Putin's leadership would have been unable to hold on. To put it bluntly, she is the soul figure who operates behind the scenes, and people have to admire Russia's economic resilience.
Nabiulina was born on October 29, 1963 in Ufa, the capital of the Republic of Bashkortostan. She is a Tatar person. The family conditions are average. My father is a driver and my mother works as an operator in the factory. She doesn't have a prominent background, but she has been learning since she was a child.
He was admitted to the Economics Department of Moscow State University in 1980 and graduated in 1986. Later, he went to Yale University as a visiting scholar, where he learned something about Western economics from 1991 to 1992. This experience gave her a little understanding of market mechanisms, which later came in handy in the chaos in Russia.
Her career started in 1991, when the Soviet Union was still alive. She joined the Economic Reform Committee of the Soviet Union of Science and Industry as the chief expert. After the disintegration of the Soviet Union, she transferred to the Russian Federation of Industrialists and Entrepreneurs in 1992 and continued to work as a consultant.
In 1994, she officially joined the Russian Ministry of Economy, starting from a consultant, and rose to the position of deputy minister in 1997. In those years, Russia's economy was in chaos, and Yeltsin's shock therapy caused a serious loss of national wealth. She is responsible for supervising banks and adjusting exchange rates, slowing the outflow of foreign exchange reserves. However, the political struggle was fierce. In 1998, she resigned due to political pressure and returned to teaching at the university.
In 1999, Putin became Prime Minister, calling her back to the government. In 2000, Putin was elected President, and she became the First Deputy Minister of the Ministry of Economy, serving until 2003.
From 2003 to 2005, she served as President of the European Centre for Business Development, coordinating international cooperation. From 2005 to 2007, she returned to the Committee of Experts of the Ministry of Economy, analyzing trade policy. In September 2007, she was promoted to Minister of Economic Development, to May 2012.
In this position, she led Russia's accession to the World Trade Organization, spent years negotiating, and finally agreed in 2011 and officially entered in 2012.
From May 2012 to June 2013, she was Putin's economic adviser and directly gave advice to the president. On June 24th, 2013, she succeeded Sergei Ignatiev as the governor of the Central Bank of Russia. This is the second female central bank governor in Russian history and the first woman in a G8 country.
After taking office, she soon faced a major test. In 2014, when the Crimea incident broke out, Western countries dropped a bunch of sanctions, the ruble exchange rate fell and the oil price fell. The Russian economy fell into crisis and inflation surged. She decided to raise the key interest rate to 17%, introduced a floating exchange rate system and also controlled the inflation ceiling.
These moves stabilized the financial system and slowed down capital outflows. Three years later, the Russian economy began to recover. Her performance has impressed the world. In 2015, Euromoney magazine named her the Central Bank Governor of the Year, and in 2017, The Banker magazine selected her as the European Central Bank Governor of the Year.
In the blink of an eye, 2022, as soon as the conflict between Russia and Ukraine broke out, Western sanctions escalated, Russia's overseas assets were frozen, and corporate exports were blocked. Nabiulina stood up again.
On February 28th, she announced a series of measures to directly pull the interest rate to 20%, shut down the stock market, engage in capital control, and avoid the flight of funds. Her policy of settling natural gas in rubles requires European buyers to pay in rubles. This move has stabilized the value of the ruble, because Europe cannot live without Russian natural gas and has to reserve ruble foreign exchange.
She also promoted the shift to the Asian market, especially to strengthen trade cooperation with China, and Russian oil and gas exports remained uninterrupted. As a result, the West's plan to bring down Russia through sanctions failed. Not only has the Russian economy not collapsed, but it will also achieve growth in 2023. Although there are war factors, her policies are indispensable.
In March 2022, it was that she wanted to resign because she felt that the sanctions were too severe and the economic pressure too great, but Putin directly refused to let her continue.
This shows that she has a close relationship with Putin and that Putin relies on her stable economy, but it has also been criticized for helping her maintain the war economy, pressing people through high interest rates and austerity policies, and indirectly supporting military operations by accumulating foreign exchange reserves.
Western countries did not let her go. In April 2022, Australia sanctioned her. In September, the United States, Canada, New Zealand and the United Kingdom followed suit and blacklisted her. She herself did not deny that the challenge was huge. In December 2023, she said that she had to prepare for the increased pressure of sanctions.
By 2024, the Russian economy faces new problems.Inflation is still high, labor shortages are severe, and enterprises are difficult to recruit.Nabi Urina continued to adjust interest rates, and in July 2024 she encouraged enterprises to bypass trade restrictions with cryptocurrencies, which is a new trick in Russia to help enterprises cope with Western ban.
Interest rates shifted from 16% at the beginning of the year to higher in the middle of the year, remaining at 21% in February 2025 and dropping to 18% in July and 17% in September.
However, there are obvious signs of economic slowdown. She said in April 2025 that Russia's economy is not in recession, but it needs to be vigilant against overheating and labor shortages. The unemployment rate is as low as 2.4%, but more than 70% of enterprises complain that they are short of people. This is related to war mobilization and draws away a lot of labor.
Putin's trust in her has not changed. In April 2022, she was appointed for re-election as governor of the central bank, and she still holds her position firmly. Her policies have allowed Russia to diversify its reserves, increase the ratio of gold to the yuan, and reduce its dependence on the US dollar. This will help Russia maintain a trade balance under sanctions. In 2024, Russia's GDP will surpass Germany and Japan in purchasing power parity, ranking first in Europe.
But internal contradictions also began, in March 2025, there were reports that she and Defense Minister Belousov and others were shaving on interest rate issues, she wanted to stabilize inflation, and they wanted to weaken the ruble to stimulate consumption.
After all, the role of Nabi Urina is the guardian of the Russian economy. She started from the grassroots, step by step to the top, relying on the expertise and practicality. Putin is well-known, with her steady economic death, without her those high interest rates, exchange rate adjustment and trade shift, Russia is early mess. But this also exposes the weaknesses of the Russian economy, relying on energy exports and war stimulation, long-term view unsustainable.
In 2025, she is also promoting reserve reform, increasing the proportion of non-US dollar assets, and responding to new sanctions. Western media often say she is Putin's secret weapon, helping the country avoid economic collapse. But critics point out that her policies have put pressure on people's livelihood, with low unemployment but wages falling short of inflation, and people's lives are tight.
Her personal life is low-key. Her husband is Yaroslav Kuzminov, a former president of the Higher School of Economics, and her son Vasily engages in sociological research. She likes listening to symphonies and watching ballets, which coincides with Putin's interests. They are not only working partners, but also confidants.
In November 2024, some analysts said that she may face pressure to restructure the central bank, but Putin is afraid of a recurrence of the 1998 crisis and has to rely on her. In April 2025, she won parliamentary praise for protecting the economy from Western sanctions. But internal strife didn't stop. Some people in the Kremlin blamed her for too tight monetary policy, which dragged down economic growth.
Russia's economy is now at a crossroads. In June 2025, Putin said the economy was strong. Despite sanctions and war, officials warned that tools were running out. Nabiullina continued to coordinate, and when Putin was worried about the economy in January 2025, she was still making moves to stabilize the ruble.
After Trump came to power, he said to add sanctions unless Putin negotiated, it was a new test for her. Russian trade shifted to the global south and BRICS countries, and her push for cryptocurrency and ruble settlement helped a lot. But in the long run, sanctions bite tight, Russia has to reform the structure, or she alone can’t stand.
Generally speaking, without Nabiullina, Putin's Russian economy would have collapsed long ago. She saved the scene twice, in 2014 and 2022, relying on professional skills to revitalize the deadlock. But it also reminds people that Russia relies on figures like her and its economic foundation is still weak.
In the coming years, she is expected to expand her responsibilities, not only for the economy, but also for the broader sphere of financial regulation. Her story is a case of modern economics, fighting western finance masters, but also exposing Russia's hardships. Putin and her accomplish each other, she is humble, never to work, but the Russian economy is ahead, and it has to be seen how she goes.