According to the Central Bank of Russia, the foreign debt of the Russian Federation reached $221.4 billion on April 1

Saturday, May 28, 2022

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Today's Izvestia, a leading daily, wrote that even the repayment of a considerable part of the country's debts had not changed the general picture, because private companies were borrowing increasing amounts overseas. Since 2002, when macroeconomic indicators allowed Russia to regain the trust of foreign capital, the overseas debts of Russian enterprises have been rising rapidly. In 2003, when the borrowings amounted to more than a quarter of Russia's state debt, the Finance Ministry sounded the alarm. The then finance minister, Sergei Kolotukhin, even spoke about potentially prohibiting state-run enterprises from borrowing overseas. But by the start of this year non-state foreign loans exceeded the state debt and increased by $13.2 billion in the first quarter alone. International institutions that closely monitor developing economies no longer see any danger in terms of Russia's solvency. Standard & Poor's, a major international ratings agency, said two years ago that the growth of foreign corporate borrowings in Russia presented no threat to the government's solvency. It also said the non-financial sector was more of a creditor, because capital that left Russia in the 1990s was returning. Oleg Vyugin, the chief of the Federal Financial Markets Service, said that in 2004 alone about 25% of all the investment resources attracted by Russian companies had come from the Russian financial market. Given that the country's gold and foreign currency reserves have now reached $150 billion, Russian banks primarily need to be worried about the level of foreign borrowings, because their weakness has left the country's business community looking for the loans they need overseas

Bookmark According to the Central Bank of Russia, the foreign debt of the Russian Federation reached $221.4 billion on April 1