Russian Vneshtorgbank will lend small and medium-sized businesses $1 billion this year, bank head Andrei Kostin said after a meeting with President Vladimir Putin last week
Published:
22 January 2004 y., Thursday
Russian Vneshtorgbank will lend small and medium-sized businesses $1 billion this year, bank head Andrei Kostin said after a meeting with President Vladimir Putin last week.
No Russian commercial bank currently has a small-business lending program, though there are a few banks that lend to small companies through funds provided by the European Bank for Reconstruction and Development.
Putin has called the small-business sector a top priority, but efforts to reform relevant legislation have done little to boost statistics.
Small and medium-sized enterprises account for less than 15 percent of gross domestic product, according to the State Statistics Committee. In the European Union that figure is close to 60 percent. If Vneshtorgbank makes good on its promise to lend out $1 billion, it would constitute the largest investment by a single organization in the direction of small-business reform.
One of the main reasons that the Russian small-business sector has not flourished is because it lacks infrastructure readily available in the West, such as lending institutions, according to a recent study by the World Institute for Development Economic Research, a United Nations-sponsored think tank.
Russia's banks have traditionally catered to small groups of industrialists, living off a lending portfolio of two or three high-volume clients. Lending programs for private individuals and small companies require the creation of an expensive retail network and more personnel for branch offices.
Šaltinis:
themoscowtimes.com
Copying, publishing, announcing any information from the News.lt portal without written permission of News.lt editorial office is prohibited.
The most popular articles
European Commission Vice-President Siim Kallas, responsible for transport, today presented to the College a preliminary assessment of the economic consequences for the air transport industry of the volcanic ash crisis.
more »
Boosting economic recovery, investing in Europe's youth and in tomorrow's infrastructures are the priorities of the 2011 draft budget adopted by the Commission on 27 April 2010.
more »
European Competition Commissioner Joaquín Almunia welcomes proposed commitments by Visa Europe to significantly cut its multilateral interchange fees (MIFs) for debit card payments.
more »
Because of the Icelandic volcano, flower growers in Colombia couldn't get their stems to markets in Europe.
more »
The Second Vice President of the Spanish government and Minister of Economy and Finance, Elena Salgado, on Sunday played down the importance of apparent fissures within the EU concerning the Greek financial crisis, expressing her confidence that all countries would support the aid package for this country, which will be accompanied by a tough budget-tightening plan.
more »
Commission launches an information campaign on the CE conformity mark - designed to ease the free movement of goods around Europe and protect consumers.
more »
If Europe's airports ever open again the introduction of new security measures like body scanners will be expensive.
more »
After Eurozone Finance Ministers agreed measures to address Greece’s financial woes last Sunday, MEPs quizzed leading economic figures, including the chairman of Goldman Sachs - former financial advisors to the Greek government - on how to strengthen EU economic governance and improve reporting of national statistics.
more »
The European Tourism Stakeholders Conference, being held in Madrid today and tomorrow, will explore ways and means to strengthen the visibility of tourism at a European level and to verify how the actions to promote a competitive EU tourism industry.
more »
The European Bank for Reconstruction and Development (EBRD), World Bank Group member IFC, and The Netherlands Development Finance Company (FMO) have joined up with the Asia Debt Management Hong Kong (ADM Capital) to establish a regional fund to invest in midsize companies facing financing difficulties as a result of the financial crisis.
more »