KSE Institute

The Kyiv School of Economics Institute (KSE Institute) is the research Arm of the Kyiv School of Economics, founded in 2020 under the strategic direction of former Ukrainian Finance Minister Tymofiy Mylovanov. Funded by Western foundations, EU instruments, and bilateral government grants, it publishes peer-reviewed economic research on Ukraine's war economy, Russian revenue denial, and sanctions effectiveness. Its editorial stance explicitly supports Russian revenue constraint as a policy objective.

KSE Institute tracked 194 shadow-fleet tanker movements in March 2026, with Russian-flag vessels' share rising to 21% of the total, data cited by the OFAC enforcement community in the same fortnight as the GL 134B expiry. The Institute's Russian Oil Tracker (monthly, lead analysts Benjamin Hilgenstock and Vladyslav Vlasiuk) and shadow fleet Tracker (April 2026 issue) are the primary public datasets quantifying Russian oil export revenues and the grey-fleet tonnage enabling above-cap Urals sales.

For European oil desks, the KSE monthly datasets are operationally significant: the Russian Oil Tracker's export revenue estimates feed directly into price-cap compliance assessments, and the shadow fleet Tracker's vessel registry is used by insurers, P&I clubs, and sanctions screeners to flag high-risk counterparties in Urals trade chains.

By July 2026 the Institute's trackers remain the reference datasets for measuring Russian oil-revenue denial, and are directly relevant to this week's developments: Russia's blanket diesel export ban through 31 July and the Urals discount's split between the Baltic loading basis and the Indian destination basis both test how FAR price-cap and shadow-fleet enforcement are actually denying Moscow revenue, the question the Russian Oil Tracker exists to answer, ahead of the EU's 13 July vote on freezing the price cap.