OREANDA-NEWS. Moody's, an international rating agency, has changed its outlook for the Russian banking sector from “positive” to “stable,” the agency’s report to the Russian media said.

Weak economic growth will prevent the improvement of the situation in the banking sector in the next year and a half, according to Moody's analysts. “The Russian economy continues to experience a number of problems, which is why our forecast for the growth of the country's real GDP for 2019 was lowered from 1.6 to 1.2%,” the agency quoted the words of its senior loan officer Olga Ulyanova.

Poor purchasing power of the population will restrain consumption, which in turn will adversely affect manufacturing and trade, said Moody's. In addition, sanctions limit access to foreign capital markets, and the economy is dependent on state support: the agency estimates the share of the public sector in the economy at 40-50%. In 2020, the growth potential of the economy will also remain low (1.5%), according to Moody's, but the banking sector will be supported by a flexible monetary policy of the Central Bank, a relatively stable exchange rate and rising government spending.