The Hungarian banking group OTP is considering a complete withdrawal from Russia. The company has now begun a review of its strategy, which it plans to complete by the end of 2026.

One of the reasons was the difficulty in withdrawing additional dividends from the Russian business over the past year. At the same time, OTP has a strategic interest in developing in the Baltic countries, said Peter Csanyi, the group's chief executive officer.

The bank's Russian business has already significantly shrunk. After 2022, OTP stopped corporate lending and withdrew intergroup financing, and its current operations in the country are almost entirely focused on retail consumer loans.

However, the scale of the Russian direction for the entire group is relatively small: OTP's share in the Russian banking market is about 0.3%. In Hungary itself, it is the largest bank — at the end of 2025, it accounted for about 28% of the country's banking assets.

Back in 2024, the Central Bank of Hungary recommended that the group reduce the volume of corporate loans and deposits in its Russian subsidiary. However, OTP did not receive any requirements from the European Central Bank to curtail its business in Russia. Now, for the first time, a complete exit from the market is explicitly named among the options being considered.