Kremlin ‘considering stimulus plan for Russian economy’

The Bloomberg financial agency says it has seen a copy of the anti-crisis plan presented to President Vladimir Putin and his top officials by the Economy Ministry and others.

It involves spending 828 billion rubles (9.3 billion euros) to support – among others – the car industry, railways, construction and agriculture. But 134 billion rubles (1.5 billion euros) of that is not yet allocated from other budgets.

And Russian anti-crisis plans have a poor track record, only 17 of the 60 programmes in last year’s were fully implemented according to Russia’s Audit Chamber.

With oil prices depressed, the budget is in tatters with some ministries calling for the selling off of shares in large state companies, including Rosneft, Sberbank and Aeroflot.

The Russian budget could face an additional shortfall of up to 2.5 trillion roubles (28.3 billion euros) this year if crude prices stay at around $30 per barrel, putting at risk the target of keeping the deficit at 3.0 percent of gross domestic product.

(euronews.com)