Russia not postponing adoption of Basel III requirements - Simanovsky
MOSCOW. Feb 18 (Interfax) - Russia is not talking about delaying its adoption of the Basel III requirements, First Deputy Chairman of the Central Bank of Russia (CBR) Alexei Simanovsky said at a press conference at Interfax's main office after a meeting between bankers and the CBR management in Bor.
"We're not talking about a postponement," he said, stressing that Russia is still falling short of introducing the Basel III requirements.
"If we're talking about the timeframes for implementing Basel III, it's no secret. We're behind schedule. As of today we haven't implemented Basel III as it follows from the Basel Committee's schedule from January 1, 2013," Simanovsky said.
At this point, Russia is nine months behind schedule.
"On October 1, 2013, we expect to transition to the Basel III recommendations that were supposed to be launched on January 1, 2013," he said.
About half of the members of the Basel Committee implemented Basel III on January 1, Simanovsky added. There are complications with its realization in Europe, the U.S. and several other countries.
"In my view, the complications in Europe are of a natural technical and legal character, since Europe has to pass legislation through the European Parliament that provides for the implementation of Basel III. Passage through parliament, particularly the European Parliament, is not a simple matter. Above all else, there are many countries in Europe, in each of which Basel III implementation involves the necessity of translation into their own languages," Simanovsky said.
If there were such difficulties with Basel III's launch in Russia, the project would be lagging by more than nine months, he said.
"All of those who have not implemented Basel III are being monitored by the Basel Committee and the international community. The decision to implement Basel III was made at the highest political level of all the Basel Committee's country members, so sooner or later, probably sooner rather than later, all of the Basel III countries will implement it, and this is a matter of months," Simanovsky said.
For Russia, "October 1, 2013 is a normal opportunity to not seriously lag behind the Basel schedule and to not be criticized by the international community and to not garner any sort of negative image for our banking system," he said.
"In fact, this is a lot of complicated work, and there will be fairly substantial revision, a reworking of the approaches to calculating capital and the determination of its adequacy. Then there will be other positions connected with liquidity and otherwise," Simanovsky said.
Earlier, CBR Chairman Sergei Ignatyev said that the CBR wants to introduce Basel III regulations in Russia as per the original plan, regardless of whether the implementation dates are pushed back in other countries.
"We have a slight delay, but in principle everything is going according to plan," he said. Asked how long the delay is, he answered, "No longer than in other countries."