Russia to set aside $15.4b for anti-crisis measures

PanARMENIAN.Net - The Russian government has agreed to set aside 500 billion rubles ($15.4 billion) in next year’s budget to directly finance anti-crisis measures if the eurozone crisis continues to escalate and spread, Finance Minister Anton Siluanov said on Tuesday, June 19.

The funds will be used to support “socially needy people” and “systemically important enterprises,” Siluanov said in an interview with The Financial Times.

In his first interview with a foreign newspaper since his appointment as Russia’s finance minister last year, Siluanov said the anti-crisis mechanism also envisaged the revival of a scheme, proposed but not implemented in 2009, to issue government bonds to recapitalize banks in exchange for shares.

The Russian government allocated 200 billion rubles for anti-crisis support to domestic companies in 2012, RIA Novosti reported.