Updated 01:20 a.m. Moscow Time
WASHINGTON, October 11 (RIA Novosti) - Capital flight from Russia in 2014 can get slightly over $90 billion but it is unlikely to exceed $100 billion, a senior Russian Finance Ministry official said Friday.
"Even 90 [billion dollars] would be a viable scenario, or even a bit more," Maxim Oreshkin, the head of the Russian Finance Ministry's state planning department, told journalists in Washington.
"I don't think we need to revise [the estimates] completely," he added, saying the central bank was not likely to adjust its prognosis for the year 2014.
The Bank of Russia said earlier its capital flight evaluation for Russia in January-September 2014 was $85 billion. The bank's First Deputy Governor Ksenia Yudaeva said the annual estimate could be increased to $90 billion.
Oreshkin said these estimates counted in all changes in the bank's account balances, which he dubbed as "pseudo-outflow." "What remains is $77 billion," he added.
Answering the question whether Russia could see capital outflow figures exceed $100 billion, Oreshkin said it was "not likely."
