Yes, that's the idea as far as I understand it, too: Rouble just dropped 4x, so it made sense that it might recover somewhat. That must have been in 1998 (I am Russian)
I remember accounts of Westerners in Russia at the time. Supposdly the official exchange rates were rubbish and you could get 10 times as many rubles for your $ from most taxis.
Here's some information I found on the time period http://www.photius.com/countries/russia/economy/russia_econo...