Professional Translation of Russian Financial Statements
Balance sheets, statements of financial results, notes and audit reports translated for the parent company, investor or auditor who has to read Russian accounts. The Russian caption stays alongside wherever it does not map cleanly onto IFRS — a working document your advisors build on, not a restatement of the accounts.
- Quoted per statement set
- RSBU vs IFRS differences flagged upfront
- Signed PDF by email
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What to Send Us
- The balance sheet, the statement of financial results, the notes, and the audit report if there is one
- The reporting period, the currency and the scale the figures are stated in
- Who the translation is for — a consolidation, investor due diligence, a lender, or an auditor's file
- Any terminology you or the receiving side already use, so we match it rather than invent our own
- Your deadline, especially if the file is tied to a consolidation close or an audit
When a parent company, lender or auditor abroad has to read the accounts of a Russian subsidiary, a word-for-word translation is not enough. Russian statutory accounts are prepared under RSBU — Russian accounting standards, built on the PBU and FSBU rulebooks — and their line captions often have no single clean equivalent in IFRS. A caption translated literally can mislead a reader who assumes it means what the familiar English term means in their own standard. Our job is to render the accounts accurately and make those divergences visible, so the reader can see what the Russian books actually say.
Why Russian Accounts Are Not a Straight Translation
RSBU and IFRS agree on the broad categories — assets, liabilities, equity, income, expenses — and diverge below that level. The balance sheet is laid out differently, the lines inside it are defined differently, and a caption whose name looks familiar may be composed under quite different rules. Similar names are the trap: the Russian word резерв may sit in the accounts as a provision, as a capital reserve or as something narrower, depending on the line it appears on and what the notes say about it.
So where a Russian caption has no clean IFRS counterpart, we translate the caption and keep the Russian original alongside it the first time it appears. That is not decoration — it is the point of the exercise. A reader comparing a figure against their own IFRS concept needs to be able to see that the underlying Russian term was something else, and to go back to the original wording if they want to check.
What We Translate
Russian financial statements travel as a set. The balance sheet (бухгалтерский баланс) shows assets, liabilities and equity at the reporting date. The statement of financial results (отчёт о финансовых результатах) shows income, expenses and the profit or loss for the period. The notes (пояснения к бухгалтерской отчётности) disclose accounting policies and break down the figures behind the headline lines. Where the accounts have been audited, the auditor’s report (аудиторское заключение) carries the opinion, and every qualification in it matters word for word.
A balance sheet without its notes is half a document. We translate the whole set against a single glossary, so the same concept reads the same way on the face of the balance sheet, in the notes and in the auditor’s discussion.
How We Work
We read the full set before quoting. That is when we build the glossary for that company: the exact captions used in the balance sheet, the accounting policies disclosed in the notes, and every item that recurs across more than one document. The glossary then governs the whole file, so a term defined in the notes is translated the same way everywhere the figure appears. If the file also includes the company’s bank statements, the same glossary applies there, so account references track between the accounts and the underlying bank records — as they do when the accounts arrive alongside Russian company documents and charters in a due diligence bundle.
The finished translation comes as a signed, watermarked PDF — a professional working document, not a notarised or apostilled one.
What We Do Not Do
We do not restate or convert accounts from RSBU to IFRS. That is an accounting engagement, not a translation: we add no lines that are not in the original and remove none that are. The accounts stay Russian statutory accounts; only the language changes.
We do not audit, review or opine on the figures, and we do not check the arithmetic. If the notes disagree with the balance sheet we will say so, but verifying the accounts is the receiving side’s work, not ours. Nor do we say whether an auditor, bank or regulator will accept the file. Anything beyond the translation itself — restatement, financial review, audit — belongs with your own auditors or advisors.
Pricing
A statement set is quoted after we have seen it: the volume of notes, the presence of an audit report and the complexity of the structure all move the figure, and we do not price accounts sight unseen. Glossary work and cross-checking terminology across the set are included, not billed separately. The price list gives the general band for other documents in this direction; send the set through the order form and you will normally have a fixed price and a delivery date within 2 hours during working hours.
Handling Russian Accounts Regularly?
Firms that review Russian subsidiaries on a cycle can set up a standing arrangement with agreed pricing and a named contact.
Frequently Asked Questions
Do you ever convert the accounts from RSBU to IFRS?
No. Restatement is an accountant's or auditor's engagement, not a translator's. We translate what is in the accounts, accurately and consistently. If you need the accounts restated, that is a separate service from an audit or consulting firm.
How do you mark up captions that have no exact IFRS equivalent?
We translate the caption and keep the Russian original in brackets the first time it appears, adding a short clarification where the line would otherwise be ambiguous. The reader sees both and can always go back to the Russian wording.
Do you translate the notes and the audit report as well?
Yes — the whole set. The balance sheet and the statement of financial results mean little without the notes, which carry the accounting policies and the breakdowns. Any audit opinion is translated too.
Do you check the arithmetic?
No. If figures in the notes do not agree with the balance sheet we will point it out, but we translate the document as written, not as we think it should read. Verification belongs to the reviewing party.
Is this a certified or notarised translation?
No — it is a professional business translation. Some jurisdictions require certification for a formal filing; many accept a professional translation for internal audit and investor reporting. Tell us what the receiving institution asks for; the final word is theirs.
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You May Also Need
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Russian Company Documents
The EGRUL extract and charter, when they travel with the accounts.
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Bank Statements
Lender due diligence usually wants the accounts and recent statements together.
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Russian Contracts and Agreements
Where the notes reference material contracts with counterparties.
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Sending sensitive financial data?
How we handle, protect and delete every document you send us.
This is a professional business translation of Russian statutory accounts prepared under RSBU. It is not a restatement into IFRS, not an audit opinion, not financial advice, and not an assessment of whether the accounts meet any bank's, regulator's or shareholder's requirements. We do not opine on the reliability of the figures, on whether an auditor, bank or authority will accept them, or on what they mean for your decisions. For advice on the content of the accounts, speak to an accountant, auditor or adviser in the relevant country.
