NEW YORK, May 12. /TASS/. The Russian ruble has become the world’s best performing currency since the beginning of the year, surpassing the Brazilian real in the ranking, Bloomberg reported on Thursday.

"Capital controls imposed by Russia have turned the ruble into the world’s best performing currency this year," the agency notes.

"It’s now up more than 11% against the US dollar since the start of the year, surpassing the real’s 9% advance to become the top gainer among 31 major currencies tracked by Bloomberg," the agency adds.

Bloomberg stresses that the ruble’s gains "result from a series of measures taken by the government to defend the battered currency in the aftermath of Western sanctions."

"On top of imposing capital controls, Russia has forced exporters to sell foreign-exchange and is demanding its natural gas be paid for in rubles," the agency says.

However, some experts the agency refers to, say "the rally isn’t credible as many currency-trading shops have stopped dealing in the ruble on the grounds that its value seen on monitors is not the price it can be traded at in the real world."

Anyway, as the agency notes, the strengthening of the ruble amid the special military operation is noteworthy, since a number of other countries that also tried to control the movement of capital failed to achieve a similar result. For example, the Turkish lira and the Argentine peso are still struggling to recover from their fall, Bloomberg says.

Earlier, strategist for the markets of currencies and interest rates of SberCIB Investment Research Yury Popov said that the Russian currency in May could strengthen to 60 rubles against the US dollar.

"The ruble will be able to stabilize around 60 per dollar until the end of the second quarter of 2022. At the same time, the weakening of the Russian currency is expected later, as imports are likely to grow, and exports will decline due to possible sanctions restrictions," Popov said. According to his estimates, from the end of the second quarter of 2022, the ruble will gradually weaken to 75 rubles per dollar by the end of the year.