OREANDA-NEWS. April 6, 2009. The economic crisis has peaked in Russia and modest growth could resume in the coming months, CBR chairman Sergey Ignatiev said Friday. What’s more, the chairman of the Bank of Russia is of the opinion that there will be no “second wave” of the financial crisis, about which finance minister Alexei Kudrin warned as a result of a potential rise in overdue debts to banks in the real economy. Sergey Ignatiev also believes that the value of the ruble vs. the bi-currency basket will not exceed the RUB 41 benchmark set by CBR until the end of the year.

As regards a potential cut in bank rates, the CBR chairman directly linked this process to a decrease in inflation which, in his opinion, could be the case as early as this year. “I believe that the most severe stage of the crisis is already over. I think that economic growth, although modest, could resume in the coming months”, Ignatiev said. The chairman of the Bank of Russia assumes that the government’s measures aimed at supporting the real sector of the national economy will necessarily yield results.

He attributed this to the fact that international oil prices stabilized above CBR’s forecasts of USD 41 a barrel. He went on to say that ruble devaluation has bottomed out and Russian producers have strengthened their competitive advantages over foreign peers. The real effective ruble rate declined 13.6% from November 2008 to March 2009. “Advantages for banks from forex operations as compared to lending to the real sector have become doubtful”, Ignatiev noted. He also pointed to improved ruble liquidity and lower interbank lending rates.