The RF payment balance posted a few record indicators for the first quarter of this year. Apart from the current account ($37 billion) and export surplus ($47.5 billion), the capital outflow was also the record high ($22.8 billion) in the first three months of 2008.
Photo: Pavel Soloviev
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Payment Balance Hit All Records
The RF payment balance posted a few record indicators in the first quarter of this year. Apart from the current account ($37 billion) and export surplus ($47.5 billion), the capital outflow was also the record high ($22.8 billion) in the first three months of 2008. The illegal export of money is accelerating. Further movement of these indicators will affect the ruble rate in particular and the economic strategy in general, the analysts speculate.
Central Bank of Russia (CBR) released the first evaluation of Q1 payment balance past Friday; the indicators were the record high for a number of positions.
Fueled by skyrocketing prices for energy and metals, the export surplus climbed to the record $47.5 billion, which is nearly three times as much as in all 1998. The foreign currency inflow to the current account reached $37 billion, more than taken for the whole 2003.
In line with expectations, the global crises led to the record outflow of net capital - $22.8 billion in the first quarter. Of interest is that both economic analysts and Russia’s authorities view it as the manifestation of today’s power of Russia’s financial system. Deputy Prime Minister, Finance Minister Alexei Kudrin even recalled the collapse of 1998, when the net capital outflow exceeded $20 billion for the year.
But the capital inflow is forecasted to resume in the near term, these expectations are shared by economic analysts in the CBR, Finance Ministry and capital banks. The capital inflow was $41.9 billion in 2006, growing to $81.2 billion in 2007. Under the latest outlook of the CBR, this year’s inflow will be between $20 billion and $60 billion. The gap of this extent roots in the general uncertainty built up by global financial crises, CBR First Deputy Chief Executive Alexei Ulyukaev announced not long ago.
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