Foreign citizens and legal entities may organise companies within the Russian territory, in accordance with the civil legislation of the Russian Federation, under reserves that may only be stipulated by federal acts. Restrictive reserves may be established by federal acts only to the extent necessary to protect constitutional status, moral principles, health, rights and legal interests of other persons, as well as for the purposes of state defence and safety.

    The first step of the registration process is the execution of the constituent documents, which include the Charter and sometimes Constituent Agreement of the company. To become founder of a Russian company, a foreign citizen has to submit a copy of his valid passport, a certificate issued by the Russian embassy of his country confirming that he is entitled to perform business activity, and a bank certificate confirming his paying capacity.

    There is a minimum charter capital of RUR10,000 required to register a company, as stipulated by the current legislation of the Russian Federation. In addition, you have to pay a duty for the registration. At present, it amounts to RUR2000.
    These documents, duly prepared and executed, are submitted to the registration authority, which issues a registration certificate and a taxpayer certificate. Then the company is assigned a state statistics code (property code, economical activity code, location code, etc.); after that, the corporate seal is manufactured, according to a sample consented in advance, and finally, the company is registered with non-budgetary funds, i.e. the Pension Fund, the Medical Fund and the Obligatory Medical Insurance Fund. The last stage of the registration process is the opening of bank accounts. These accounts have to be in the currency of the Russian Federation and optionally in a foreign currency. The whole process takes about a month.