​Russian industry: decent performance in manufacturing, mining is still suppressed by the OPEC+ deal

RUSSIA ECONOMICS - In Brief 15 Dec 2020 by Alexander Kudrin

---

Rosstat reported that industrial output was down by 2.6% and 3.0% y-o-y in November and in 11M20, which looks slightly better than could be expected earlier. An upward revision of October statistics is one of the reasons. Rosstat revised up October statistics in manufacturing, but at the same time, it slightly revised down previously reported data on the mining sector.As a result of such revisions and relatively good performance in November, in seasonally adjusted terms, industrial output was up by 1.0% m-o-m. Mining was down in November by 7.6% and 6.8% y-o-y in November and 11M20. It will still be down by 6.8-6.9% for the full year. A rebound of around 4.5% to 5.0% in 2021 looks likely. However, this forecast is subject to revisions as Russia’s mining may be influenced by future OPEC+ agreements. Manufacturing was up by 1.1% in November, while in 11M20, it was almost flat (down by 0.1% y-o-y). Note that these figures could be revised next month as it has already happened several times in the previous months. Manufacturing will remain flat in 2020 as a whole, and it will steadily grow in 2021.In November and 11M20, extraction of oil was down by 11.0% and 8.4% y-o-y accordingly. The same figures for the extraction of natural gas were also negative (-2.0% and 7.6%), while LNG production was up y-o-y in November and 11M20 by 6.2% and 3.7%. As car production is catching up (9.8% up y-o-y in November, but still down by 19.7% in 11M20), steel production is also looking up (6.5% y-o-y in November) so that it was almost flat y-o-y in 11M20. As happened in previous months, the performance was quite uneven across sectors. For example, food production was steadily growing, while...