The Russian ruble is tumbling on Wednesday.

The petro-currency is down by 0.7% at 57.8029 per dollar as of 8:06 a.m. ET.

Earlier, data showed that retail sales fell by 2.3% year-over-year in January, better than forecasts of a 5.2% drop.

This was the “least bad” reading since December 2014 and follows the prior month’s reading, which showed that retail sales fell by 5.9%.

However, unemployment rate ticked up to 5.6% in January, up from 5.3% in December.

As for the rest of the world, here's the scoreboard as of 8:11 a.m. ET:

    The US dollar index is up by 0.2% at 101.60 ahead of the Fed minutes. The Federal Open Market Committee's minutes from the January 31/February 1 meeting will be out at 2 p.m. ET. Traders will be on the lookout for any hints the Fed may give as to when the next interest-rate hike may occur. The market currently sees a 38% chance the next hike happens in May, according to data compiled by Bloomberg. The euro is down by 0.2% at 1.0513 against the dollar. Eurozone CPI came in at 1.8% year-over-year in January, in line with expectations. Meanwhile, the German Ifo Business Climate Index came in at 111.0 in February, following the prior month's reading of 109.9. The British pound is down by 0.2% at 1.2450 against the dollar after data from the Office for National Statistics showed that the UK economy grew by 0.7% in the fourth quarter of 2015. The Japanese yen is up by 0.6% at 113.02 per dollar.