俄罗斯搬到“控制Lite”来管理一个汹涌的卢布

On December 15 theCentral Bank of Russia(CBR) seized the world’s attention with a dead-of-night 650-basis-point hike in its key interest rate, to 17 percent. The shock measure was aimed at stemming panic selling of the ruble, which had fallen by as much as 11 percent against the U.S. dollar in the previous day’s trading. A no less important — though less publicized — move came the next day, when Russian Prime Minister Dmitry Medvedev summoned chiefs of a dozen principal Russian exporting companies to his office to lay down the law on the ruble.

分析师表示，石油和金属巨头的囤积货币和金属巨头巨头已经是卢布的低价因素。“除了CBR销售的货币之外，几乎没有外汇的外汇供应，即使是一个非常谦逊的采购订单可能导致卢布溃败，”苏格兰皇家银行集团俄罗斯首席经济学家Tatiana Orlova说伦敦。在12月16日会议之前的公开言论中，Medvedev敦促企业老板开始将其收入转化为卢布“有线比利地稳定”。为了确保他们遵循，他要求向政府高级经济监督员提交中央银行和一支由副总理牧师的工作队提交日常报告。

The joint initiatives by the central bank and the premier, plus an announcement from Russia’s Ministry of Finance (Minfin) that it would sell up to $7 billion on its own books from taxes collected in hard currency, calmed markets momentarily. The ruble rallied explosively on December 17 and the next day closed near the previous week’s levels. The卢布队也明显抵抗美元和欧元the weekend of December 20 and 21. The moves heralded a new, multipronged strategy for managing the ruble, a task that was previously left exclusively to the CBR with its traditional instruments of raising rates and selling currency reserves. Although investors have wondered whether Russia would reach for capital controls in place of these market mechanisms, events this week indicate a more subtle approach — a sort of “controls lite” that the Kremlin hopes can tame volatility without resorting to the kind of money embargoMalaysia imposedin response to the late-1990s Asian financial crisis.

If exporters cannot be informally persuaded to repatriate earnings “rhythmically,” the State Duma, Russia’s lower house of parliament, is considering a bill that would require them to disgorge 50 percent, a regime that existed until 2006. Russian authorities are also thinking about limiting hard currency purchases by individuals. Retail savers increased the volume of hard currency and precious metals accounts by an ominous 13 percent in November, whereas ruble deposits declined slightly, according to CBR data. Other possible defensive measures include increased reserve requirements on open forex positions held by banks, or apunitive Tobin tax关于货币交易，Alexei Yegorov，Promsvyazbank在莫斯科的高级分析师。

财政部在这些棒球斯德哥斯基斯基银行（SEB）的主要新兴市场嫌疑人的主要俄罗斯银行，在这些俄罗斯银行的嫌疑人的嫌疑人曾在这些棍棒上悬挂着迷人的胡萝卜。“米芬很可能会廉价地向一些银行提供资金，以便他们将购买卢布，并提供一些保证他们不会赔钱，”他说。

俄罗斯seems capable of walking a technocratic fine line, using state muscle to support the ruble without turning to the kinds of capital controls that would mark it as a long-term financial outlaw in the Malaysian mold. “Foreign investors should only be concerned about controls that could impact interest and dividend payments, direct investment and debt flows,” Alina Slyusarchuk, Russia and CIS economist for Morgan Stanley in London, wrote in a research note. She sees a “strong case for” conversion requirements on exporters, while also noting that “many countries restrict individuals from opening accounts or taking loans in forex.”

哈马卢隆还迄今批准了这一战略。“俄罗斯当局看到坚定的行动肯定是乐观的，而不仅仅是CBR，肯定是一个原因，”他说。

But this action, even backed by Russia’s $415 billion in currency reserves, will prove to be little more than a Band-Aid without shifts in the two fundamental conditions weakening the ruble, languishing oil prices and Western sanctions stemming from Moscow’s involvement in Ukraine, analysts say. “The measures will be sufficient for a few weeks, maybe a month or a month and a half,” writes Anna Bodrova, senior analyst at Alpari, one of Russia’s most popular online platforms for currency trading. “But we need to cure the illness, not arrest the symptoms.”

During his annual year-end press conference on December 18,弗拉基米尔总统普京dimmed any hopes that the ruble crisis would soften his stance on Ukraine. He likened Russia to a bear whose enemies “will always try to chain it. After they chain it, they will rip out its teeth and its claws.” Having made clear his position, he said he anticipated no end to the West’s effective financial blockade of Russia and warned his nation to be prepared for two more years of economic decline.

Central Bank governor Elvira Nabiullinaforesaw similar difficulties ahead, though in less graphic language. “The weakness of the ruble is a signal to the Russian economy to adapt to new conditions,” she told official press agency TASS after her dramatic rate increase. “We really must learn to live in a ruble zone, counting for the most part on our own sources of financing.”

CBR预计，如果石油在基准布伦特原油下降约60美元的目前的约60美元，俄罗斯的经济可能会在明年下降5％。这是在半夜的利率上涨之前。虽然俄罗斯银行大多是短期贷款，其利率可以以自己的借贷成本向上调整，但跳跃肯定会增加不完整的贷款，这些贷款已经悬停在危险的7.5％的系统中，Seb的Hammarlund表示。

“What we did reflects a choice between the bad and the very, very bad,” Sergey Shvetsov, the CBR deputy governor who oversees financial regulation, told the newspaperVedomosti. “It could have consequences for the financial market that I will not try to exactly predict.”

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