Finance Ministry expects average oil price of $40 per barrel in 2016 - Siluanov
MOSCOW. Dec 30 (Interfax) - The Russian Finance Ministry forecasts the price of oil to average $40 per barrel in 2016, Finance Minister Anton Siluanov said in an interview with the Rossiya 24 television channel on Wednesday.
"We, in fact, must be ready for any development of the situation surrounding the price of oil. Our estimates for next year are about $40 per barrel in the budget estimate. At $40 per barrel there is an understanding of how we are to act, measures that have been prepared," he said.
He said some of those measures and proposals involved working with revenues, privatization and the consolidation of budget spending. "So we'll be looking and responding as early as the beginning of next year," he said.
The 2016 budget assumes oil will trade at $50 a barrel. Siluanov said in the middle of December that he thought oil might fall to $30 a barrel at times next year.
The ministry estimates the revenue shortfall will be 750 billion rubles if oil averages at $50 a barrel and the deficit will widen to 4.1% of GDP (3.2 trillion rubles), above the 3% limit; and the Reserve Fund will be left with just over 600 billion rubles at the end of 2016.
If oil falls to $40, the budget shortfall will be 1.6 trillion rubles or 2% of GDP, Siluanov has said. In that case the deficit will be more than 5% of GDP and the Reserve Fund will have less than 200 billion rubles at the end of 2016.
