How much more will the Russian economy live? And then it will be like in the nineties? What will the government do then?

The economist Oleg Buklevshev answers. During the default of 1998, he worked in the Ministry of Finance

In the second week after the invasion of Ukraine, the International Rating Agency Moody= lowered the sovereign credit rating of Russia from Garborni to the Pravontny. Does this mean that the default can be expected tomorrow? How will he affect the income of Russians and will the government take any measures to slow down inflation? Medusa talked with the director of the Center for the Center for the Study of the Economic Faculty of the Economic Faculty of Moscow State University Oleg Buklemishev, who worked in the Ministry of Finance in the late 1990s, and in the 2000s in the government.

- Rating agencies and analysts warn of the sovereign default of Russia. What will this mean for the economy and for people? And is it still possible to avoid default?

- In a broad sense, everything that is happening now is that Russia is “cut” from international space in all basic directions. And default is a “sawing” in one of these basic directions.

Strictly speaking, I do not see any obstacles to the fact that, among other things, the [Russian authorities] also declare default. It is strange to declare war on almost the whole world, to hint at the use of nuclear weapons, how the leading foreign experts in the Russian nuclear complex qualify this, and at the same time continue to pay those with whom you are in such a tense relationship. From my point of view, this is the paradox of the current situation: people suddenly became worried about default, while there is a lot of terrible things around him.

Believe my experience, I was professionally engaged in most of my life that I overcame the defaults - first the post -Soviet, and then the 1998 default. Even if the default is happened, then yes, it hurts, it is unpleasant, but with agreements it is all cured in a short time - and the creditors are still satisfied with the debtor if the debtor ultimately begins to behave responsibly.

- And what exactly will happen to the default? Suppose Russia announces that it can no longer serve its external obligations - what happens after that?

- In today's times, nothing special happens. It used to seem that default is a disaster, it was followed by the arrests of accounts, a refusal of market financing of the corporate sector, and so on. Now all these issues are not on the agenda. Therefore, I say once again: default is the smallest pain that Russia can now worry, no matter how difficult it is to say it to me.

Is it possible to avoid it? Yes, theoretically, now you can buy all the conversion debt papers - they are cheap, and I suspect that Russia still has reserves to provide it all. But I do not think that someone will strain and actively do this, because it is simply pointless.

-Can we compare the current crisis with something that Russia was experiencing in its history? With the nineties? Maybe even since 1918 ?

-I think that even in 1918 the situation was different, because people then believed that this would all be temporarily and soon. Now such a direct way out of the situation is not visible and, accordingly, it is not clear how all this will be resolved and resolved. There are different opinions on this subject, but I believe that in the acute phase all this will not last very long, although very painful. And the consequences will have to be disgraced for the rest of their lives.

Now the difference is exactly what: it is clear that all this will someday end, but it is not clear how. 1998- Yes, at the first moment it also seemed that this was the end of the world, something that for many years worked on was buried and abandoned. But 1998 showed very well that if the market, market relations and people who want to work for the benefit of themselves, their family and their country are preserved, then it is quite possible to overcome default in a short time. And to make sure that no one will believe that the default was at all. And in general, you can forget about it soon.

Today I still do not see where such a mood comes from, such an optimism that will allow us to hastily move forward and get out of these fragments. Because without fundamental reorganization and transformation of everything that is happening today in Russia, economic recovery is impossible.

The question is how and on which rails all this will be rebuilt. I am convinced that now no one understands how this will be done, therefore no one understands how long and [how] the default will last painfully.

- If you try to look into the future and present various scenarios: suppose that in the near future Russia will complete the “special military operation” - how likely is it that after this sanctions will be lifted and the economy will begin to restore?

- I think that acute sanctions will be removed after that, but, frankly, I do not believe that everything will be restored - for the simple reason that the repetition of everything that happened over the past two weeks will no longer want to. There will be no kisses, hugs and acceptance into a friendly family of peoples anymore.

In the worst case, the survival, the existence of the country in the backyards of the rest of the world, which will allocate humanitarian help or something else, so that the infrastructure will not collapse so that the aircraft continues to fly.

The worst option is an option without development, a variant of slow extinction. I would like to avoid this option in some way, and you can probably avoid it, thinking about what brought us to this point and how we are going to get out of this point. So far, I am not observing this kind of thought in Russian society.

- Now there are a lot of discussions about the so -called Iranian scenario *, when, among other things, the country may encounter a total ban on energy supply. So far, only the United Stateshas been a complete ban * , which account for a small share of Russian oil exports. But if there is a scenario in which Russia falls under the same embargo as Iran, what will this mean for the economy? And how much is it likely?

- The Russian economy is wider and more diversified than Iranian, and, moreover, Russians are Europeans, at least Russian elites. I think that if it comes to such a scenario, then Russia will lose a million, and maybe a couple of million people who will find use somewhere in other parts of the globe. Moreover, I mean the elite of various kinds - not even businessmen with cultural figures, although they are also. This process has begun and it will continue at all pairs. I would not expect something good from the Iranian script.

-And what can happen inside the economy if the total oil and gas embargo is still introduced? Will we see attempts to reorient export, trade through intermediaries following the example of Iran?

- One way or another, this fate would befall. Not now, so ten years later, because no one really prepared for the energy transition ( replacing hydrocarbons with cleaner energy sources - approx. Medusa ). Beautiful goals were declared, all this flowed from one state program to another, but by and large there was no preparation for the radical change in the country's payment balance ( that is, a reduction in oil and gas revenues - approx. Medusa ) was carried out.

And the questions were very important, for example, is it necessary to resettle and re -profile Kuzbass? How will its economy function in the context of a sharp reduction in coal demand? The carbon fever that has been observed in recent months, because it is also doomed to come to naught. Yes, there are possibilities of switching Russia's export to other directions, but it seems to me that all this is very painful and it is extremely difficult to replace the goods as large in terms of export.

Although the Russian economy is diversified wider than other oil giants, the threat of removing a large piece from the payment balance and without any sanctions. The fact that the West is determined to do this now, in my opinion, obviously, and no one will, especially living in the neighborhood, count on such an unreliable supplier.

Already today, a gas pipeline in Ukraine is such a paradoxical image: blood is pouring around, buildings are destroyed, and the sacred gas pipeline is on the spot and gas continues to flow through it. The point is not that oil or gas in itself are bad. Roughly speaking, refueling his car, the German burgher will recall the city of Kharkov. In the current world, this, as it turned out, for many countries at some point becomes intolerant. They closed their eyes for a very long time because the business was profitable, and today triggers worked - strong enough for them to refuse from this point of view. “The main thing is that Russia continues to supply oil and gas to us, and at least the grass is not to grow there” - from this point of view they left. And I think they left forever.

- How can you imagine inflation in Russia now and at the end of the year?

- Until the end of the year, there are still a lot of things to be about: how will the money will begin to print, what loans will be issued ... Today, Prime Minister Mikhail Mishustin announced the next plan, collected on the principle of “all sisters in earrings”, and the main source of ensuring this plan that remained now is a printing press - in the broad sense of the word. A credit printing press, an ordinary printing press on which you can print money and distribute it to socially unprotected categories of citizens. There are a lot of trajectories, and I do not think that someone will now give you a forecast for inflation. We have already accurately reached 20%, only judging by the key rate , which is now so much. By the way, in Ukraine now a key rate is 12%, this also says a lot.

- Is there enough instruments for the Central Bank to fight with such inflation?

- It depends on what the central bank wants to fight this. Help the country to increase defense capacity? Then, probably, no tools will be enough. The last increase in the rate, as I understand it, was made in order to restrain the outflow of funds into currency, although it was obvious that this would not work. Obviously, with a crumbling currency course, people run from the ruble regardless of the interest rate, because no one just believes in it.

As one of the financiers said: “I am not worried about my money, but a return of my money.” The refund now bothers people much more than the percentage of their money, whatever it may be, and in this sense there is no difference, the key rate is 20, 25 or 40 percent - this bet is still absolutely overwhelming for normal economic activity, and in order to restrain people from conversion into currency, it is useless. Moreover, capital control has already been introduced - I don’t know why they cut this tail for so long. They cut it and cut and now bang.

- And if you look from the other side - at potentially possible attempts to maintain consumer demand? For example, any payments?

- It seems to me that this term itself is wrong, because supporting demand means that this demand is in itself, and you increase it. In this case, we are talking about something else - so that people have something to eat.

- Yes, more precisely - to maintain purchasing power.

- Yes, this is not a demand, it is rather such support - especially for the poorest categories of the population. So far they have not gathered anything from the garden so that they would not fall into complete poverty. This task is indeed, it seems to me, is a priority at the current stage, because if there are interruptions in commodity supplies, especially if now the price mechanisms begin to twist, fight the speculation that we are usually done ... there will be a blow to the [retail] networks.

- Regulation of prices.

- This is the path to nowhere. “Give more money,” and give money - prices are even higher.

-That is, it turns out that if you increase any subsidies and payments now, will this increase inflation?

- It depends on what. Now it’s difficult for me to look at the budget, what fell out of it and what is not. For the next three months, probably enough. But now, on the one hand, they will begin to delay the belts , and on the other, they realize that there are no costs less-they have become more in a sense, because the same critical import will now take away a considerable share of foreign currency resources, and this is that the budget used to easily pay. And how all this works in a partially blocked export, I, frankly, do not understand very well. To generate income, it is necessary that some streams, processes in our economy also go, some demand existed. How this all will work, I do not understand very well.

- Returning to foreign exchange control - it is clear that everyone now thinks what will happen to ruble savings. Do you see some scenario in which they are nationalized?

- No, I do not see. There is no sense in it, it is easier to print and fill ATMs with money. Like [Yuri] Shevchuk sang in his time: "Walking around, printed rubles and tucked the piggy banks." That's how they will refuel. Technically, I do not see any problem in this. The budget rule has never been a real fetish, and now even more so.

- They said about the complete ban on energy carriers, but are there any other sanctions of the Day of Day - well, to be even worse? Or is there nowhere to fall?

- I’ll say a terrible thing - for sure there is, we just don’t know about it yet. Surely there is already, for sure [civil servants] have already warned that if that - it would be like that.

I had not recommended to jump with a saber for sanctions before and laugh at them in vain, and now even more so, when everyone sees what is happening. It seems to me that the current [position] is enough to destroy the Russian economy in a fairly short period.

- And what is, by the way, a short period?

- My estimates - in such a mode we will probably be able to exist for three months.

- The philosophical question: is it possible to say on how reserves accumulated, by other signs, was the Russian economy ready for all this? And was it preparing?

- There was confidence that at least Europe would touch anything. And therefore, everything was reinforced in the euro . But the scope and depth of the unity of sanctions were a complete surprise.

As for other things - craving for import substitution, for example - I always said that the Soviet Union was ready to fight with the whole world. That is why all technological chains were hidden inside. Little crawled out, and if it got out, then to the territory of the socialist camp. Russia did not have such an opportunity, and there is no socialist camp either. After all, Russia lived as a market economy in recent years. This means that many internal links were replaced by external in any technological chains according to the economic principle, and not in the name of "security". In every serious technological process there is a small finhthyf, which is produced somewhere else.

What happened to the aircraft is one weak place. At the next stage are semiconductors. There is no its own production in Russia. Create it from scratch - there is no technology or skills, now people will also scatter, who were able to do it. Sitting them in a “sharashka” is also not very promising in the current conditions.

-You can buy something Chinese through Iran-used.

- You see, this is good when you have one detail there, two details. And when you need to do this according to a wide spectrum - from a managerial point of view, this is insanity. This is a special operation, a thousand of special operations that you need to carry out at the same time. And these thousands of special operations are insanely expensive and managerly unrealized.

- The mass outcome of companies from Russia - to what extent is it a political position, and in which - the inability to conduct business with torn logistics chains, with a volatile course?

- I think that both. But at the current stage, this is rather such an emotional reaction, because there were some attempts when the competitor leaves: “Yeah, I will capture [the liberated niche] now ...” They probably could somehow change their minds, to somehow change these chains, somewhere to import. But the moral pressure that is going on now is stronger than benefits, so it’s really easier for them to suspend their operations.

I don’t think that someone wants to leave here forever, but it is clear that the income has tightened and will be compressed yet, and in the absence of productive opportunities for economic activity, and from the point of view of consumer demand, and from an investment point of view, the country is becoming less interesting. That is, here, of course, a combination of both moral and competitive factors.

- Do you consider the realization of the remaining assets real? There are already such statements , not from the most responsible speakers, but nevertheless

- Well, what does it give? Well, you nationalized these assets - what will you do on them? Assets must be controlled. This is a business. How this non -core business will be operated on under the leadership of the commissioners - well, I do not know.

- And where do they get the same details, materials that were imported.

— Детали и материалы, может, и будут поступать в качестве гуманитарной помощи, но национализация ничего не даст. Люди мыслят в категориях бухгалтерского баланса: вот кусок собственности, в нормальное время он стоил пять миллионов долларов. Если я его конфискую, у меня будет пять миллионов долларов? Nothing like that! У тебя будет комплекс технологического оборудования и здание, которое скорее головная боль, чем какой-то ликвидный актив. А чтобы его запустить и он заработал, еще потребуются определенное умение и навыки.

— Когда вы говорите — да и не вы один — слова «разрушить экономику», «крушение экономики через три месяца» — что это значит? Как мы себе можем это представить в каких-то более детальных, осязаемых вещах?

— Я представляю это скорее как остановку определенных технологических процессов, которые останавливаются не потому, что нет спроса на продукцию или по каким-то еще экономическим причинам…

— Как при ковиде было.

— Да, когда был ковид, мы обсуждали эту тему и было очень важно, чтобы технологические цепочки не прерывались из-за того, что где-то встало предприятие. Вот сейчас вполне возможно, что технологические цепочки будут прерываться из-за того, что где-то кончились запасы. КамАЗ уже объявляет о необходимости срочного импортозамещения, у АвтоВАЗа заканчиваются полупроводники и так далее. Таких вот прерываний процессов в ближайшие три месяца, на мой взгляд, будет критически много. Ровно поэтому я и говорю, что до социального кризиса еще не дойдет, технологический кризис наступит раньше.

— Наступает технологический кризис — и что это означает? Это остановка предприятий, массовая безработица?

— Да, причем не продиктованная ничем, кроме таких вот прерываний цепочек из-за физического недостатка каких-то маленьких финтифлюшек в том числе.

— Специалист по рынку труда Владимир Гимпельсон всегда говорит, что у нашего рынка есть особенность — у нас увольнению предпочитают отправку в неоплачиваемый отпуск. Она сохранится, как вы думаете?

— Она сохраняется, сейчас «Макдоналдс» заявил о ней, IKEA заявила . По сути это то же самое: они рассчитывают на то, что разум восторжествует и бизнес войдет в какие-то нормальные берега. Ничего странного в этом нет: в экономике, в которой квалифицированный труд так редок, это естественная реакция на временные шоки. Вопрос в том, насколько временный этот шок. Если он действительно временный, то есть шанс что-то такое повосстанавливать.

— А временный — это, условно, несколько месяцев?

— Да, это те самые три месяца. Если в течение нескольких месяцев ничего важного [меняющего существующую ситуацию] не происходит, то тогда всем выдаются уведомления об увольнении — и до свидания.

Замораживание рабочей силы — это всегда управление временными шоками; как только становится понятно, что шок перманентный, этот механизм отходит и [тогда работодатели] просто режут издержки и забирают то, что могут забрать. Оплачиваемый отпуск или неоплачиваемый — в одном случае деньги получают и могут что-то кушать, в другом деньги не получают, но тоже ничего не делают. В экономике, где безработных много, это, конечно, беда.

— Как тогда может отреагировать государство? Повысить пособия по безработице? Устроить раздачу разовых выплат?

— Понимаете, вы исходите из того, что там сидят какие-то невероятные стратеги, которые все понимают и знают, как все будет. Они собрали со всех предложения, сейчас из них сформируют планчик, опубликуют, обеспечат его каким-то финансированием. Немножко сельскому хозяйству, немного дадут [на] кредиты, чуть-чуть этому, чуть-чуть тому, чуть-чуть сему. Но цельного образа происходящего, думаю, судя по реакциям, ни у правительства, ни у Центрального банка нет.

Talked by Margarita Lyutova