OREANDA-NEWS. September 01, 2008. To a certain extent, deposit yields are trimmed by the Savings Bank still committed to a tough interest rate policy in respect of household deposits. Indeed, the average interest rate on household deposits in Russian Roubles with a 1 year maturity calculated on the basis of 15 top banks, including the RF Savings Bank, was estimated at 8.59% per annum in July, and net of the Savings Bank, – at 9.49% per annum, reported the press-centre of BDO Unicon.

The poorest performance was demonstrated by EUR-denominated deposits pulled down by the euro’s weakening against the Russian currency by 1.87%. In July deposits in the Euro-zone currency lost 1.18% in value.

Moscow real estate continues to be the most profitable investment target: over July investments in the capital’s real estate appreciated by 2.38%. Prices for Moscow real estate are firmly set on the upward trend climbing by 2.72% over the month. Real estate investments proved to be the star performers among other savings instruments on a year-on-year basis: their rouble yields reached 17.30% versus August 2007.

“Metal” accounts lost 1.02% in value due to sinking quotations of precious metals (gold prices sagged by 0.9%). However, their rouble yields posting 14.32% year-on-year were second best after robust returns on real estate investments.

The stock market fell in July under the pressure of news. The RTS index dropped by 12.3%. Real rouble yields of units in unit investment funds were for the greater part negative: rouble yields of equity and mixed investment funds were negative in July, the best performance being -4.63 and -0.32% per annum, respectively. And only certain bond unit investment funds succeeded in generating positive yields with the top result at 1.05%.

Our research conclusions are based on the analysis of interest rates of Russia’s 15 top banks: the RF Savings Bank, Alfa-Bank, Gazprombank, Bank of Moscow, Rosbank, Raiffeisen Bank Austria, Uralsib, Vozrozhdeniye, Bank Petrocmmerce, Citi Bank, VTB-24, URSA Bank, Promsvyazbank, Saint-Petersburg Bank, Rosselkhozbank).