in 1994 amounted to at least 38.4 trillion rubles ($17.4 billion at the average annual dollar-ruble exchange rate) or 6.1 percent of GDP, which is almost as much as the 6.3 percent share of agriculture in GDP and more than the value added tax collected by the federal budget (6 percent of GDP in 1994).Of the 38.4 trillion rubles in illegal revenues, yields from pyramids and other "investment" projects accounted for 20 trillion rubles. Adjusting for one-time fluctuations (the early 1990s were record years for criminals; many pyramid schemes have since collapsed ), in 1994 criminal revenues still amounted to 22.4 trillion rubles, or 3.6 percent of GDP. The financial sector generated 53 percent of all criminal income, (12 trillion rubles, or $5.4 billion). Two-thirds of this amount came from falsified credit and other payment operations and one- third from pyramid frauds.Fraud Is SurgingRussian criminal statistics report misappropriation of property and property rights in a single category, regardless of whether the case was fraud, theft, or racket. About 50 percent of all recorded economic crimes are identified as property thefts. Theft from the workplace has become a "low profit" activity, and economic crime has become more of a white-collar business: fraud increased fortyfold between 1992 and 1995. A breakdown of fraud by sector in 1994 (the latest year this data set has been available) indicates that most cases of fraud—24 percent—were committed in the financial sector, followed by commerce and catering (13 percent), industry (9 percent), and agriculture (7 percent). Two major cities, Moscow and St. Petersburg, accounted for 28 percent of all fraud cases."Professional" crimes have shot up in recent years. Their share in all registered crimes increased from 17 percent in 1993 to 34 percent in 1995. The share of crimes related to abusing position or office for private gain dropped notably—the incidense of office malfeas...
