“The new package of sanctions has blocked one of the last channels of currency inflow to Moscow.”, — write: www.unian.ua
The new package of sanctions has blocked one of the last channels of currency inflow to Moscow.
The tight monetary policy of the central bank is causing more and more criticism / photo REUTERSThe ruble fell on Wednesday, November 27, to its lowest level in more than two years. A combination of low oil prices, new sanctions against Russian companies and rising government spending on war are putting increasing pressure on the country’s economy.The publication Politico writes that the Central Bank reacted to this by suspending the purchase of currency until the end of this year. This will limit the supply of the ruble and, accordingly, support the exchange rate.
The measure will help curb rising inflation, which has forced the central bank to raise its key interest rate to 21%. According to official data, inflation is 8.5%, but the real rate of inflation is likely to be much higher.
The ruble has been under constant pressure all summer as the price of oil has fallen due to weak Chinese and European demand and rapidly growing supply from the US, Brazil and Guyana. This week alone, Brent crude oil prices fell by almost 4% amid an easing of the ceasefire between Israel and Hezbollah.
That pressure intensified after the US imposed new sanctions on Gazprombank, which until then had been allowed to process payments for the remainder of Russian gas exports to Europe. The new package of sanctions also affected 50 Russian banks with international ties, more than 40 Russian securities registrars and 15 Russian officials.
“The imposed sanctions are having a negative impact, which Russians feel mainly in the form of high inflation,” said Grzegorz Drozdz, a market analyst at Conotoxia.
The central bank’s tight monetary policy is drawing increasing criticism from the country’s leading industrialists, such as steel baron Oleg Deripaska and Serhiy Chemezov, the influential head of the Rostec defense conglomerate.
“We need serious discussions on this topic,” said the head of “Severstal” Oleksiy Mordashov. “This is a situation that probably has no precedent in modern world history, when the Central Bank rate is 2.5 times higher than inflation, and it is still not slowing down.”
The fall of the ruble – the latest newsOn Wednesday, November 27, the Russian ruble collapsed. As of 17:29, the exchange rate was 113.25 rubles per dollar. At the same time, as of November 27, shares of the Russian gas giant Gazprom fell to a historic low – almost $1 per share.
Panic in Russia due to the fall of the ruble spread to the food market. Supermarkets are forced to urgently rewrite price tags. Analysts expect that in the near future the prices of imported products in the Russian Federation will increase by an average of 15-20%, provided that the devaluation of the ruble stops. In turn, prices for local products will rise by at least 10-15%.
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