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Bankers: Deal Impacts Economy, Not Shares

Russia's landmark deal on its debts to commercial banks will have a positive impact on the economy but little immediate effect on share prices or the sagging ruble, bankers and economists said Thursday.


They said the framework agreement, signed in Madrid on Wednesday and giving Moscow more time to pay debts of $24 billion built up in Soviet days, would boost Western investors' confidence that the economy was moving in the right direction.


"It doesn't seem to have done a great deal immediately but the long-term impact is very positive," said Mary Ginsberg, director at LTS Finance.


Western bankers have said they expect the deal to lead to more foreign investment in Russia, stimulating economic growth.


"The inflow of foreign investment will probably outpace the repayments under the agreement. The fact that there is now an agreement should cause the inflow we have seen to increase further," said Maarten Pronk, general manager of ING Bank.


But there appeared to be little impact on Russian markets.


Pronk said the market for Russian assets traded abroad had already moved, in anticipation of the debt deal.


Prices of Vneshekonombank bonds maturing in 1996 rose on the debt deal to between 80.5 and 81 percent of par value but then slipped back to 79 percent. They stood at 78 percent a week ago.


The bonds were issued to firms whose accounts in the bank, the former Soviet foreign trade bank, were frozen amid an acute liquidity shortage in January 1992.


"On the local market we see very little change as a consequence of this," Pronk said.

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