CBR head of research says September hike was a 'one-off'

Speaking at a conference in London on Thursday, CBR head of research, Alaxander Morozov, reportedly said: "At the moment we're just right in terms of our policy rates."

According to Reuters, Morozov also said the monetary authority would stick to its plans to stay away from foreign exchange markets until the end of 2018.

Later in the session, Sputnik cited CBR Governor Elvira Nabiullina as having held out the possibility of an acceleration in the rate of growth of Russian GDP from between 1.5% to 2.0% in 2018 to 3.0% in 2021 "in case of successful implementation of the government's planned economic policy measures".

Other local reports also had Nabiullina down as having said that a scenario of sharply lower oil prices in 2019 was unlikely, with the Governor reportedly adding that Russians should not be overly concerned by higher interest rates, as the risk of significant future hikes had in fact decreased.

As of 1554 GMT, the US dollar was 0.33% higher versus the Russian rouble to 66.4535.