Half of foreign exchange reserves Russia frozen
The Tass (Russia) news agency on March 13 reported, in an interview with the Rossiya 1 television channel on the same day, Russian Finance Minister Anton Siluanov said that half of the gold and foreign exchange reserves of the Russian Central Bank had been frozen due to sanctions. .
“That’s about half of the reserve. We have total reserves of about $640 billion. Right now, we can’t use about $300 billion of these reserves“, she says.
The Russian minister revealed that part of Russia’s foreign exchange reserves are denominated in Chinese currency. However, Western countries are currently pressuring China to restrict trade with Moscow.
Russian Finance Minister Anton Siluanov. Photo: TASS
“Of course, there is pressure to limit our access to the reserves we have in the renminbi. But I think our partnership with China will allow us to maintain cooperation [mà hai bên] achieved, not only to maintain but also to multiply“, said Mr. Siluanov.
The Russian minister added that for countries that restrict the use of Russia’s foreign reserves and are deemed “unfriendly” by Russia, Russia will pay its debts in rubles until the gold and Russian foreign reserves are not frozen.
Earlier, the Kremlin press office said that President Vladimir Putin had signed a decree “On the provisional procedure for the performance of obligations to certain foreign creditors”, which allows private or Russian companies to pay their foreign creditors in rubles.
Although sanctions have hit Russia’s financial sector, the Russian Finance Minister stressed that the country has sufficient capital to ensure the production of essential goods and necessities.
Globally influenced
RIA Novosti (Russia) news agency reports that the Russian government now has many options for dealing with various Western sanctions and the Russian Central Bank is actively taking action to stabilize the country’s foreign exchange market.
According to the assessment, Western sanctions have affected the Russian financial industry to some extent. The Guardian reported that International Monetary Fund (IMF) President Kristalina Georgieva on March 13 commented that Western sanctions had increased the risk of Russia defaulting on its debts. “Russia has enough money to pay its debts, but Russia cannot use this money“, she says.
Georgieva fears that Western sanctions could trigger a recession in Russia this year and that in the event of a default the impact could extend beyond Russia and Ukraine. Last week, he said, taking into account the impact of the Russia-Ukraine conflict, the IMF would lower its previous forecast for global economic growth to 4.4 percent in 2022.
The President of the International Monetary Fund also said that the total investment of banks in Russia is about 120 billion USD, although this figure is not small, a default will not cause a global financial crisis.
However, compared to the difficulties inflicted on the financial industry, Western sanctions could have a negative impact on the global food and energy sectors. Georgieva said soaring prices of barley and other commodities would be a “big blow” for countries that have not yet recovered from the economic downturn caused by the Covid-19 pandemic.
at Blogtuan.info – Source: Soha.vn – Read the original article here
