How the Central Bank fights manipulation

Over the 13 years of fighting against manipulation of the securities market, the Bank of Russia has identified more than 130 cases of such transactions, over the past five years – up to 13-14 per year. We are talking about incidents that have reached the stage of sending instructions and informing law enforcement agencies.

According to statistics posted on the website of the Central Bank, the cases cover the entire spectrum of areas of the financial market – transactions with shares, bonds, shares of investment funds, as well as transactions with currency and futures instruments. The manipulation uses securities of both large companies (for example, RusHydro, Raspadskaya, etc.) and less liquid ones (Saratovenergo, Permenergosbyt, etc.). Sometimes whole groups are involved in illegal actions – from two to several dozen people (or their accounts are used).

The terms for detecting such cases are quite long, the investigation of incidents rarely takes less than a year. However, they are gradually decreasing. In particular, for cases identified last year, the regulator, as a rule, spent a year and a half. In the previous four years, the process had taken longer, with cases often taking three to five years to uncover.

Since the beginning of 2023, only one case of manipulation has been identified so far. Two individuals traded in futures contracts under a prior agreement from October 2021 to July 2022.

Dmitry Mikhailovich