Russia’s economic troubles, including the weakening of the national currency, the rouble, have pushed up costs of foreign businesses operating in the country. With the economy expected to downturn, the rouble remains volatile after losing around 45 percent of its value against the dollar this year. CCTV America’s Anya Ardayeva reported this story from Moscow.

Economic forecasts point to a recession in Russia next year, accompanied by skyrocketing prices, and double-digit inflation.

As rouble continues to recover from a massive plunge last week, foreign business owners in Russia are bracing themselves for a tough year ahead.

“I think clearly rouble weakness is presenting challenges with regard to those suppliers that are present and established here,” Chief Economist of Deutsche Bank Yaroslav Lissovolik said. “In terms of imports into Russia this is quite a significant challenge, because the weaker rouble stokes import substitution and presents essentially a barrier to greater inflows of imports into the country.”

A Chinese restaurant owner with the surname Chen said the rouble rate directly affects her profits.

“My biggest wish now is that the rouble exchange rate will be stabilized, so that my restaurant can have a stable profit. In this way, we need not change our prices on the menu from time to time,” Chen, who did not give her first name, said.

Chen says the costs of running her restaurant went up 25-35 percent as the crisis worsened.

Russian President Vladimir Putin voiced confidence last week that the economy would recover, but said it could take up to two years to normalize.

Last week, Ikea Russia also suspended sales of some of its products for two days citing a large number of orders being processed. Apple has also halted its online sales due to extreme fluctuations of the rouble.

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