Central Banker Says Worst of Crisis Over

Russia has come out of the sharpest phase of its economic crisis, capital outflows have ceased and foreigners are returning to Moscow stocks, Central Bank First Deputy Chairman Alexei Ulyukayev said Friday.

He also indicated that the economy might get a further boost from interest rate cuts, which could start as soon as the second quarter thanks to easing inflationary pressures.

Officials now seem to be diverging in tone, with some taking heart from stabilizing oil while others, most notably Finance Minister Alexei Kudrin, insist that it is too soon to relax.

"We may be mired in this for another year or two, but the critical phase of the crisis has passed," Ulyukayev said in an interview on Ekho Moskvy radio. "We have macroeconomic balance. We might not like it because of the production decline, the outflow of capital and high inflation, but it's a predictable situation, business understands how to work and banks know how to lend."

Russia is headed for its first recession in about a decade, and Ulyukayev warned that the economy might contract more than the official forecast of 2.2 percent this year.

On the upside, however, "there is an inflow into the stock market -- we see how quickly our bourses are growing in February and March -- [and] foreign direct investments are continuing," he said.

The MICEX Index has surged 37 percent since the start of the year, while the broad MSCI emerging-markets benchmark has added just 6 percent.

Ulyukayev was also upbeat on the ruble, saying it could average 32 to 33 per dollar this year rather than the 35.1 level factored into the budget.

The Central Bank has revised its 2009 capital outflows call and now expects them to be less than the $83 billion factored into the revised budget by the Finance Ministry. Ulyukayev said the forecast could be cut further when the Central Bank reviews the figure Monday.

The Central Bank will urge financial institutions to take preventative measures by building up reserves against potential bad debts, he said, and as long as overdue loans do not top 10 percent of the credit portfolio, the banking system should be able to cope without major problems.

Alfa Bank president Pyotr Aven said in an interview with the Financial Times published Thursday that bad loans could hit 15 percent to 20 percent by year-end. He also predicted hundreds of bankruptcies in the Russian banking sector, while the state would focus on saving the 20 to 30 largest lenders in the 1,200-plus banking system.

While bad loans are increasing amid the slowdown, Russian banks have an average 16 rubles of capital for every 100 rubles of assets, a "significant buffer" compared with the 10 percent adequacy ratio required by the regulator, Ulyukayev said.

"There's no cause for alarmism," Ulyukayev said. "The situation is nothing out of the ordinary and is predictable. I don't think we'll see hundreds of bankruptcies."