To the start!

The currency market was wearing. First (on Wednesday), the ruble entered as a revengeant and suddenly went in a counterattack for a dollar with the euro. The next day, the Central Bank published a summary of its losses on the currency front. They are impressive: from August 8, 2008, when international reserves were at the maximum, until January 16, 2009, that is, in five months, they were reduced by a third - to $ 396.2 billion.

What's in the dry residue? Wednesday events, of course, are the attack of the ruble, but rather mental. The explanation is a temporary shortage of rubles, caused, in addition to the actions of the monetary authorities, by tax payments. More important - statistics of the Central Bank. She shows that reserves are approaching the last line. This opinion is not mine. This is evidenced by investment bankers: below $ 300 billion, to lower international reserves of the Central Bank is already risky. Let me remind you that over the past week, reserves decreased by $ 30.3 billion.

Devaluation occurs. The Central Bank promises that the ruble will not be lower than 36 per dollar. There is nothing catastrophic in this. The released imported niche can successfully occupy the domestic manufacturer

Now the walls of the currency corridor are completely different. The ruble in relation to the dollar was already devalued by a quiet sapa by almost 40%, it is significantly less to the bivalyut basket, but still impressive. Further, the Central Bank promises that the ruble will not be lower than 36 per dollar. Without sprint jerks, as he hopes.

There is nothing catastrophic in this. In war, as in war, that is, a crisis - he is a crisis.

The devaluation closes the road with imports, the niche can successfully occupy the domestic manufacturer. That is how the rise of the Russian economy began in 1999, opening the almost ten -year era of Russian prosperity. True, then the fall of the ruble was more sharp that, as the academician of the Russian Academy of Sciences, Viktor Ivaner believes, led not just to import substitution, but to “imports”. I think in 2009 there is enough import substitution.

Chinese statistics are talking about a global scale of potentially opening opportunities. That China is a world factory (which England was at the dawn of the industrial revolution), no one should convince anyone. When, for example, you go to Moscow, London or Helsinki to the Finnish Clothing company store, is it no longer surprising that a significant part of the proposed products on Finnish patterns is sewn in China? I'm not talking about non -reference consumer goods and the most diverse types of technology.

So, since November 2008 (this month was not black for one Russia), Chinese statistics have shown exports. Relatively insignificant - in December it amounted to 2.8% in annual calculus, but promising. There are such estimates: economists of the Air Force agency argue that "the export of goods produced in China has sank to the lowest level over the past decade."

I will believe the colleagues. Moreover, their conclusion sounds like a shot from a starting gun for a Russian manufacturer who comes across a lack of demand. If the persistent and most competitive Chinese manufacturers are chopping off, then Russian demand (the one that survived, and, I repeat, he survived even after the much more frightening August 1998) will simply satisfy, except for the Russian manufacturer. If he managed to learn something.

01/22/2009 The material was published in the newspaper No. 10 dated 01.23.2009.