A review of the predictions made by experts from 2022 to 2026 shows, first, that nobody produced an accurate forecast. And second, that the mistakes of loyalist analysts were no greater than those of their colleagues who do not depend on the Putin regime.

By many indications, Russia’s period of stagnation that has existed almost since the middle of 2024 is now coming to an end. Understandably, experts are trying to predict what will come next.

It seems plausible to suppose that those who, over the years of the war, more accurately predicted the zigzags of the Russian economy will manage better this time too. So let us familiarize ourselves with how they fared up to now.

Within weeks of the full-scale invasion of Ukraine, economic experts split into two main camps: the “Collapse Party” and the “Stagnation Party.”

There is a third group, the “Triumph Party,” which is too small to be worth discussing. Among those constantly present in the public sphere, the most with his permanent forecast that Russia stands on the threshold of “colossal economic growth” — usually 10-15% a year. There’s no point entertaining his ridiculous predictions, so we should focus on the debate between collapse and stagnation. 

After Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, the West cut it off from SWIFT, seized any reserves it could get hold of, fairly quickly curtailed purchases of gas and oil and, to the extent it could, blocked supplies to Russia of numerous intermediate products and goods on which its national economy depended.

The Russian economy should have collapsed if it clung to its pre-war assumptions. If it adapted rapidly to the new circumstances, it could instead get away with stagnation.

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In March 2022, most economists were in the Collapse Party. Knowledgeable people did not spare the public a catalogue of the economic horrors to come.

Sergei Guriev warned that the war would cause the largest economic decline since the early 1990s and that the Kremlin wouldn’t direct any women to the task of........

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