Raiffeisenbank gets right to place temporarily idle Moscow budget funds in deposits
MOSCOW. Jan 27 (Interfax) - Raiffeisenbank has joined the list of credit organizations into whose deposits temporarily idle funds from the Moscow budget could be placed over three years, the bank said in a press release.
One placement can amount to no more than 150 billion rubles. The limit is set depending on the size of the bank's own funds and its international long-term credibility rating. Moscow's financial department will place the temporarily idle funds in the deposits of participants who offered the highest interest rate, the press release said.
The list of banks that could potentially receive Moscow budget funds also includes Sberbank of Russia , VTB , VTB 24 and Bank of Moscow , based on information from Moscow's financial department. Raiffeisenbank is the only credit organization on the list without government participation. Besides that, it is a subsidiary of a foreign bank - Raiffeisen Bank International AG.
Inclusion in the list will grant Raiffeisenbank access to additional liquidity, a shortage of which Russian banks have often complained about.
Foreign banks could gradually reduce their presence on secondary markets due to the complicated situation in the eurozone, experts say.
VTB CEO Andrei Kostin has said that the level of competition from subsidiaries of foreign banks is falling due to the difficult situation abroad. "If Western banks collect money here and send it to their head offices, clearly they will restrict lending here. The level of competition from Western banks in Russia is falling," he said.
Raiffeisenbank was Russia's 10th largest by assets at the end of 2011, according to the Interfax-100 ranking.