Читать книгу Putin's Russia - Группа авторов - Страница 37

Victor Gorshkov

Financial sectors are crucial in establishing sound economic systems, and they play an important role in advancing sustainable economic growth. For many developing and emerging economies, the establishment of sound financial (banking) systems remains a significant challenge. For Russia, in particular, despite being a government priority for years, the development of the financial sector has still failed to facilitate domestic investment and modernisation.

According to the Global Competitiveness Report published by World Economic Forum, in 2000, Russia ranked 55th in terms of growth competitiveness and 52nd in terms of competitiveness. In 2018, it ranked 43rd out of 140 countries in competitiveness. Progress in building Russia’s national competitiveness has been slow. Financial sector development remains the second weakest after health (100th): in 2018, Russia ranked 86th in terms of global competitiveness of its financial system. Soundness of banks (114th), banks’ regulatory credit ratio (109th), financing of SMEs (106th) and non-performing loans (97th) remain major “paint points” of the current financial system.

The financial crises of 2008 and 2014–2015 had a negative impact on Russia’s economy. Some researchers claim that the banking crisis started in 2008 is still ongoing (Gevorkyan, 2018). Following the imposition of economic and financial sanctions imposed by the West, Russia lost the opportunity to attract cheap financing from international (primarily European) capital markets to provide liquidity to its undercapitalised banking system. Financial sanctions significantly reduced domestic investment and almost eliminated Russian export finance (Åslund, 2019, p. 197). These crises exposed the Bank of Russia’s macroprudential deficiencies.

Russia is a bank-based financial system. The banking sector assets-to-GDP ratio significantly exceeds that of insurance companies, non-government pension funds, investment funds, and securities market brokers (Gorshkov, 2018a). This chapter provides an overview of recent trends in Russia’s banking sector, focusing on institutional and macroeconomic aspects.