On 8 September Minfin published federal budget spending on national projects as of 1 September, with a table giving the allocation, cash spending and execution rate for each of the 20 national projects and the 121 federal projects within them. The ministry reports one number: 4,047.4 bn roubles, 62.1% of the plan. Set that table beside the one published on 10 August for 1 August, and August alone accounts for 580.4 bn roubles of cash spending. Of that, 82.4 bn sits in a single federal project which, over the previous seven months, had spent 169.6 mn roubles of a 103.0 bn allocation. The allocation did not move.
What the ministry says
“According to preliminary data, the execution of federal budget spending on the implementation of national projects as of 1 September 2026 amounted to 4,047.4 bn roubles, or 62.1% of the planned budget allocations. […] Overall, the execution of spending on the implementation of national projects for the 8 months of 2026 corresponds to the approved cash plan for the execution of the federal budget and amounts to 100% of the cash plan.”
A month earlier the same sentence read 3,466.9 bn roubles and 53.1%, and the cash-plan line said 99.5%. The monthly flow is never published. It has to be taken as the difference between two statements, and that difference is 580.4 bn roubles. The rounded totals in the two releases give 580.5; the files behind them give 580.4, and the files are what we use throughout.
Against the months before it, August is large. 3,467.0 bn roubles over seven months is 495.3 bn a month; August is 17.2% above that average.
One warning for anyone opening the files. The header of the money columns says “mln roubles” and the numbers are in thousands. The 1 September total reads 4,047,357,216.1, which is the ministry's own 4,047.4 bn only if it is read as thousands of roubles. Every figure below has been converted on that basis.
The project that spent almost nothing before August
The federal project is “Raising investment activity”, part of the national project “An effective and competitive economy”. Both files give it the same annual allocation, 103,032.5 mn roubles. Its cash spending on 1 August was 169,633.5 thousand roubles — 169.6 mn, or 0.16% of the annual allocation. On 1 September it is 82,561.1 mn roubles, or 80.13%.
That is 82.4 bn roubles in one month, and 14.2% of everything the national projects paid out in August. Measured against its own allocation it is the largest move of the month across all 121 federal projects: 79.97 percentage points. Measured in roubles it is second, behind “Support for the family”, which paid out 223.5 bn — a line of recurring social payments where a large month is what a normal month looks like.
The denominator is what makes this reading safe. When an execution rate jumps, the usual explanation is that the plan beneath it was cut. Here the plan is identical in both files to the last decimal. This is money that left the treasury.
What it paid for is not in either document. Neither the release nor the table names a recipient, and a project that spends 0.16% of its annual allocation over seven months and 80% in the eighth is not being financed as it goes.
Two more started from zero, four have not started at all
The same pattern appears twice more, on a much smaller scale. “Development of the rare and rare-earth metals industry” stood at 0.00% on 1 August and 45.57% on 1 September, paying out 0.5 bn roubles against an allocation of 1.1 bn. “Production of innovative transport” went from 0.00% to 17.58%, or 0.2 bn against 1.1 bn.
Four federal projects still show 0.00% eight months into the year: “Development of the backbone network of seaports”, with an allocation of 2.0 bn roubles; “Creation of overseas infrastructure”, 1.3 bn; “Production of domestic goods for the tourism industry”, 0.7 bn; and “New technologies and production of lithium-ion and post-lithium electricity storage systems”, 2.4 bn.
In the other direction there is almost nothing. Of the 121 federal projects, exactly one shows less cash on 1 September than on 1 August: “Digital platforms in the social sphere”, down 184.3 mn roubles. A cash line that moves backwards is a correction, not spending, and the files do not say what was corrected.
One percentage rose because its denominator fell
“Internet access infrastructure” shows the opposite mechanism, and it is worth setting beside the first one. Its execution reads 45.49% on 1 August and 71.57% on 1 September — a jump of 26.1 points. But its allocation was cut from 45.1 bn roubles to 32.9 bn over the same month, while its cash rose by 3.0 bn. Had the allocation stayed where it was, the September reading would be 52.14%. Most of that jump is the denominator, not the payment.
The cut carries through to the national project above it. “The data economy and digital transformation of the state” lost 11.9 bn roubles of allocation in the month, of which 12.2 bn came off this one federal project. “Industrial provision of transport mobility” lost 6.9 bn, and the identical 6.9 bn came off a single federal project inside it, “Production of aeroplanes and helicopters”. Across all national projects the allocation fell by 13.7 bn roubles while cash spending rose by 580.4 bn. Where the money withdrawn from those lines went, the table does not say: it gives an allocation per project, never a transfer between them.
The aircraft line has a counterpart we reported yesterday. In the same month of August the National Wealth Fund placed 190.3 bn roubles, 95.8% of it in aviation. One source of aircraft money is being trimmed as another pays out. We are not claiming the two transactions are connected — nothing in either document links them — only that they are the same month and the same industry.
The ministry's own explanation, published the next morning
At 11:00 on 9 September Minfin published its preliminary estimate of federal budget execution for January–August. It contains the reason, in the ministry's own words:
“The leading dynamics of the execution of federal budget expenditure in January–August 2026 is due to the prompt conclusion of contracts and the advance payment of certain contracted expenditures.”
The aggregate is consistent with that. Spending for the eight months is 31,724 bn roubles, 14.7% above last year, of which state procurement is 8,996 bn against 6,603 bn a year earlier — up 36.2%. Revenue is 25,929 bn, 9.2% higher: non-oil-and-gas revenue 20,910 bn and up 18.1%, oil and gas 5,019 bn and down 16.7%. The ministry notes separately that 691 bn roubles of dividend income arrived in August alone, which is most of what makes the non-oil-and-gas rate look the way it does.
An advance is not a saving and not an extra cost. It is the same obligation paid earlier, and it takes the flexibility with it: money spent in August cannot be re-decided in December, and money not spent in December cannot be moved to something more urgent.
Six days ago we reported the central bank describing the reverse in the previous quarter. In its banking review the CBR wrote that corporate lending accelerated in the second quarter partly because budget spending fell by 1.4 trillion roubles, so companies borrowed against state-contract payments that had not yet arrived. Now the ministry says its own spending is running ahead because contracts are being signed quickly and payments advanced. Both statements can be true of different quarters. Read together, they describe a payment schedule that moves — which is exactly why a single percentage of annual execution says so little about the year.
What this changes in our model
Nothing today. The deficit indicator scores 65 out of 100 and reads a rolling twelve-month deficit of 3.3% of GDP through July. That is a different measure from the one in this morning's release, which gives the calendar-year cumulative: a deficit of 5,795 bn roubles for January–August, 2.5% of GDP. The two are never to be mixed. What is worth noting about the second figure is where it already stands against the year's own law: 426-FZ of 28 November 2025 provides for a full-year deficit of 3,786 bn roubles, or 1.6% of GDP. Eight months in, the cumulative deficit is 53% above the number the law sets for twelve.
The strength index stands at 47 out of 100, in the stress zone, and no indicator moved on today's ingest. Front-loading does not by itself add to the annual total. It may therefore leave the rolling measure untouched while making the pattern within the year look nothing like the plan.
What we do not know
Above all, who received the 82.4 bn roubles. Neither the release nor the table names a recipient, gives a purpose, or distinguishes an advance from a payment for work done. A sum of that size arriving after seven months of almost no spending has the shape of a one-off contribution to somebody's capital. But the shape of a payment is not evidence of its nature, and the documents say nothing.
We also do not know where the withdrawn allocations went. The table gives the plan for each project on two dates and no movement between them, so the 12.2 bn taken off internet access infrastructure and the 6.9 bn taken off aircraft production can be traced out of those lines and nowhere further.
And the ministry's central claim cannot be checked from outside. It states that execution is at 100% of the approved cash plan, up from 99.5% a month earlier. The cash plan itself is not published, so there is no document against which either figure can be verified. What can be verified — the allocation, the cash and the arithmetic between two dates — is what this article uses.