Economic results 2014 - largest robbery of the country

2024 Author: Seth Attwood | [email protected]. Last modified: 2023-12-16 15:55

The economic results of the past year can be described in different words: the currency crisis, the fall of the ruble, economic sanctions, the increased capital flight from the country, inflation exceeding 10%, the decline in oil export revenues, the unprecedented "mortality" of Russian banks, the threat of a federal budget deficit, the turn of Russia's economic cooperation to the East, etc. A lot has already been said and written about this.

From my point of view, unfairly little has been said and written about the fact that in 2014 the financial block of the government allowed one of the largest robberies of our people in the last two decades. Perhaps larger robberies in comparison with the latter were only the actual confiscation of deposits in Sberbank of tens of millions of citizens by the government of E. Gaidar more than twenty years ago (as a result of a frenzied acceleration of inflation). Or the so-called "default" of 1998, provoked by the government of S. Kiriyenko (a threefold drop in the exchange rate of the ruble).

Our Central Bank, according to the Constitution of the Russian Federation, is obliged to ensure the stability of the national currency - the ruble. This is not just a beautiful phrase, some kind of abstraction from the category of macroeconomics. This is the economic security of our state and the well-being of our citizens. Due to the particular importance of this political, economic and social task, it is fixed in the Constitution of the Russian Federation. The Bank of Russia has many tasks and functions (they are spelled out in the Federal Law on the Central Bank of the Russian Federation), but the above task is the most important one. The Bank of Russia last year not only failed to cope with this task. There was a strong feeling that he was doing everything possible to “rock” the ruble.

In 2014, as a result of a sharp fall in the ruble exchange rate and in the context of a high dependence of the Russian market on imports of consumer goods, there actually was a partial confiscation of citizens' ruble deposits. Let's try to assess its scale. If we assume that the average value of ruble deposits of individuals in the past 2014 was equal to 13 trillion. rubles, and that the ruble lost almost 50% against the dollar over the year, we come to the following conclusion. 6, 5 trillion rubles were stolen from the population, who kept their savings in ruble deposits of Russian banks. rubles. The devaluation of the ruble, admitted by our authorities, has enriched some of the currency speculators by billions (maybe, not even rubles, but dollars). But from ordinary citizens, 6, 5 trillion were stolen. rubles. If we translate this amount into a dollar equivalent at the end of the year exchange rate (about 60 rubles per dollar), we get losses of more than $ 100 billion. If we recalculate this amount at the exchange rate of the beginning of last year (33 rubles per dollar), we get about 200 billion dollars.

Of course, in order to carry out “thin” assessments, one must take into account the terms of ruble deposits and the schedules of money movement in deposit accounts. In order not to waste time on assessing these "subtleties", I propose to take the average value. We get $ 150 billion.

This, of course, is not all. After all, the population always has cash rubles in a pocket, purse or under a mattress. According to the Bank of Russia, the cash money supply outside the banking sector as of January 1, 2014 was 6.985.6 billion rubles, and on December 1, 2014 - 6.920.0 billion rubles. Nominally, the ruble supply for less than a year remained almost unchanged, but in dollar terms, only half of it remained. Holders of rubles who used them for current purchases and payments did not feel depreciation, but those who kept rubles under the mattress actually suffered losses. Let only ¼ of the entire cash in rubles be kept under mattresses. In this case, we have real losses approaching 1 trillion rubles. Again, if we translate into dollar equivalent at the average rate of last year, we get about $ 24 billion.

According to our, very rough estimates, the loss of the population as a result of the "experiments" of the Central Bank with the "floating ruble" cost our citizens an amount equal to 7.5 trillion. rub. The sum consists of the losses of those who kept rubles in banks (6.5 trillion rubles), and the losses of those who kept rubles under the mattress (about 1 trillion rubles). Losses are denominated in rubles at the beginning of 2014. And in dollar terms, the losses can be estimated at $ 150 billion + $ 24 billion = $ 174 billion.

It would seem that the authorities should have shown a sense of responsibility towards their citizens. What happened happened. The perpetrators will be brought to justice, and the citizens will be compensated for their losses. There are different options. For example, to index the liabilities of banks to their holders of deposit ruble accounts, taking into account the depreciation of the ruble. This option has a serious disadvantage: most of the banks will collapse immediately, and our banking system will remain “horns and legs”.

Another option provides for the possibility of paying losses to depositors by the Deposit Insurance Agency (DIA). Alas, this option, which would seem to be the most optimal, also does not work. As of December 1, 2014, the Mandatory Deposit Insurance Fund (the financial base of the DIA) had an amount equal to 88.5 billion rubles. As the saying goes, "to the kids for milk." All that remains is the state with its budget and various off-budget and off-balance-sheet funds. But our state took a different path. At the end of the outgoing year, the energy of our State Duma was channeled not into the channel of protecting the rights and interests of citizens "thrown" by the monetary authorities, but into the channel of protecting all the same banks. On December 19, the State Duma voted in favor of a law authorizing the issuance of federal loan bonds worth 2 trillion rubles by the Ministry of Finance of Russia from December 31, 2014 to December 31, 2019. On December 25, the law was approved by the Federation Council, and on December 26, signed by the President of Russia. The placement of securities has already begun.

From the mobilized funds 1 trillion. rubles will go to replenish the capital of Russian banks, most of which are already on their way. The people's representatives said nice words that this "infusion" will allow Russian banks to direct loans to the real sector of the economy, to engage in import substitution. "The tradition is fresh, but hard to believe." Why bother banks if the ruble will weaken? Yes, today offshore games in the context of economic sanctions are becoming risky for Russian banks. Instead of lending investments in the new Magnitogorsk and Dniproges, they will begin to "invest" in foreign currency and speculate with it. 1 trillion will go like water to sand. It would be better if this money went to compensate the investors robbed in 2014. However, the law does not provide for this.

Another trillion is planned to be "poured" into the capital of the DIA. But maybe this billion can be used to compensate robbed investors? No way. The DIA's money is paid only to the depositors of those banks that have gone bankrupt. And the depositors robbed in 2014 as a result of the collapse of the ruble do not fall into this category. Of course, they have a chance to fall into this category this year, 2015, when the banks in which our stubborn depositors continue to keep money will burst anyway. But then they will receive their consolation prize with completely discounted pieces of paper. However, even completely devalued pieces of paper are still not enough for everyone.

Our humane authorities, in order to somehow sweeten the bitter pill that our citizens had to swallow in mid-December 2014, decided to increase the limit of bank deposits subject to insurance from 700 thousand to 1.400 thousand rubles. It is noble, of course, but it would be more correct to call it not an increase in the insurance limit, but its indexing. It would be better if our authorities made a decision on the indexation of bank deposits, extending this indexation not only to new deposits, but also to those that “burned out” last year.

Above, we talked only about the loss of individuals. The losses of our enterprises and companies cannot be accounted for at all. According to the Bank of Russia, as of December 1, 2014, the funds of legal entities (the bulk of them are enterprises and companies) in banks (deposits and other types of accounts) amounted to 21.6 trillion. rub. Of these, foreign exchange amounted to 8.5 trillion. rubles, and ruble funds - 13, 1 trillion. rub. As you can see, the ruble funds of individuals were approximately equal to the ruble funds of legal entities. It turns out that if we apply the same method of calculating damage as for deposits of individuals, we will receive losses of legal entities from the collapse of the ruble, equal to the same $ 150 billion. If we sum up the losses of individuals and legal entities caused by the depreciation of ruble accounts in banks, we get $ 300 billion.

According to World Bank estimates, Russia's gross domestic product (GDP) in 2013 amounted to $ 2.097 billion in nominal terms. And when calculated at purchasing power parity (PPP) of the ruble, the GDP will be equal to 3.461 billion dollars. Apparently, the growth of GDP in Russia in 2014 will be purely symbolic. Consequently, we can say that the losses from the depreciation of ruble funds placed with Russian banks, as a result of the depreciation of the ruble, amounted to: 14% in relation to GDP in nominal terms; almost 9% in relation to GDP, calculated at PPP.

All the manipulations of our authorities in the financial and banking sector do not inspire any optimism. The monetary and financial system is not viable; it is in agony. The measures taken by the government and the Central Bank in 2014, especially at the end of the year, can be characterized as follows. First, these were the last attempts to “snatch” something for “loved ones” under the guise of “verbal interventions” using magic spells not very clear to the common man, such as “repo”, “liquidity” or “base rate”.

Secondly, some of the measures were reminiscent of injections of "painkillers"; money from our foreign exchange treasury acted as "painkillers" (primarily for the purposes of so-called "foreign exchange interventions"). But, on the one hand, the effect of injections is limited in time. On the other hand, the supply of "painkillers" begins to melt before our eyes. These not very happy reflections lead to the conclusion: it is no longer possible to keep our monetary and financial system on "painkillers" injections, and there are no longer any opportunities. She urgently needs to be treated, and surgery may be required.

Valentin Katasonov - Doctor of Economics, Professor, Chairman of the Russian Economic Society named after S. F. Sharapov