Bank of Russia came out with an alternative viewpoint on the situation concerning the Russian ruble. During the period of a catastrophic devaluation of the national currency, when experts as well as ordinary people are very cautious about the outlook for the ruble, Bank of Russia stated the obvious preconditions for its strengthening. “We do not see the impact of some big factors that will affect the depreciation of the ruble. In fact, the decline in oil prices which has been the third largest in 40 years has already affected the exchange rate,” the head of the central bank Elvira Nabiullina said. Main problems, according to the economist, are left behind and currently there are much more real preconditions for the ruble’s strengthening. The last drop was expected and happened due to the key interest rate cut to 15%. Regarding necessity and reasonability of floating exchange rate of the national currency Nabiullina said that the ruble would have lost in value in any case, so the decision was efficient and timely. In addition, the risk of foreign exchange reserves spending is almost eliminated at the moment. "There is no such a risk, since we have switched to a floating ruble exchange rate to avoid spending of the currency and gold reserves to support the ruble. [...] It is vitally important for the country to have a cushion of currency and gold reserves. We have enough of that - slightly less than $400 billion. There are various international standards of sufficiency of the currency and gold reserves to import volumes, and short-term debts. We are exceeding all such standards," the head of the central bank Elvira Nabiullina said.
