Trading in post‐crisis Russia: customizing payment options to facilitate trade

Finnish‐Russian trade has declined to 7‐8 per cent of Finland’s exports by volume. In spite of this decline, and the most recent Russian crisis (August 1998), the Russian market still offers great potential by virtue of its sheer size, proximity and the experience Finnish business has in international operations with Russia. The case made here though is that, before Finnish firms can take advantage of these three factors it needs to adapt (customize) the payment options it offers to its Russian buyers. Thus, instead of the favored settlement being made totally by prepayment, mixing pre‐payment and payments against documents satisfies better both parties – importer and exporter – in this post‐crisis era. This conclusion is, moreover, transferable to countries other than Finland either engaged in, or pursuing, international operations with Russia.