SAMARA, Russia - Russia's government is pondering ways of supporting Vnesheconombank, which the United States has recently put on its anti-Russian sanctions list, an aide to Russian President Vladimir Putin said on Monday.
“Either it will be extra enlargement of its capital or it will be some other measure. This matter is being worked on at the moment,” Andrei Belousov told reporters.
As one option under consideration, “the banks that have fallen under restrictions would be sold foreign currency by the central bank in the market,” Belousov said. Besides VEB, the sanctioned banks are Gazprombank, Bank Rossiya and SMP. “Or there would be rubles to enable VEB to buy foreign currency in the home market,” the aide said.
“VEB won’t be left without assistance, and will unquestionably fulfill all its client commitments,” Belousov said, mentioning that a while ago it had been decided to enlarge the lender’s capital by about 200 billion rubles by converting National Welfare Fund deposits.
So “VEB isn’t getting a serious blow,” the aide said.
By and large, the sanctions “won’t cause any big, serious limitations, though, of course, there do arise certain difficulties for VEB,” Belousov said. “We assume that common sense will take the upper hand and the main line will be not to whip up sanctions but primarily to organize constructive work.”
