Russians have started going to pawnshops more often.

      During the first six months of 2025, Russian citizens took out loans at pawnshops totaling 190 billion rubles, according to the Bank of Russia. Demand for pawnshop services continues to grow. The number of borrowers increased by 12% over six months due to an influx of new clients. At the same time, regular customers have become more active in using the service: the average number of active loans per borrower rose from 1.8 to 2 contracts. After the moratorium on applying the full cost of consumer credit (PSK) ended, interest rates fell in the second quarter. Currently about 75% of loans are issued with a PSK of less than 100%. This allows borrowers to more often repay loans on their own and reclaim pledged items: one third of loans are repaid early; a quarter are repaid on time as specified in the contract; only 15% end with the sale of the collateral. Pawnshops emphasize that they continue to thoroughly check their client base and collateral. Loan refusals are possible in cases of doubts about the authenticity of an item, absence of documents, or suspicions that the item does not belong to the client.