Private deposits in Russian banks will grow up to 29.5% this year - DIA
MOSCOW. Aug 12 (Interfax) - The Deposit Insurance Agency (DIA) has improved its forecast for how much private client deposits with Russian banks will grow this year to 25.5%-29.5%.
The DIA said in a statement that it expects private citizen funds in the banking system will increase 1.9-2.2 billion rubles in 2010, the volume of such funds ending the year at 9.35-9.65 trillion rubles. The agency back in May predicted deposits would grow 22%-27% this year.
There were 7.464 trillion rubles in private bank accounts at the end of last year, having increased 26.8% over the year.
The forecast presumes a continuation of macroeconomic stability and positive trends on world financial and commodities markets, steady personal income growth, a gradually strengthening ruble against the bicurrency basket ($0.55 and EUR 0.45) throughout the year, and continuing favorable deposit yield.
In H1, Russian banks saw private accounts swell 12.7% to 8.411 trillion rubles (9.9% in the same period last year). The DIA sees this substantial inflow of deposits as a result of changes in the population's savings habits, though such changes were more characteristic among high-income depositors. Additional factors were the capitalization of high deposit rates, which reached a peak a year ago, as well as continued positive returns on deposits amid low inflation.
In H1, the number of deposits from 700,000 to one million rubles increased 30%, from 400,000 to 700,000 rubles - 17.1%, and over one million rubles - 16.7%.
The share of thirty top banks of volume of private deposits ticked down from 79.3% to 78.4%. The drop was mainly at Sberbank of Russia , whose share decreased from 49.4% to 48.3%. Twenty banks accounted for 71.7% of all deposit inflow.
According to the DIA, the average interest rate (weighted by deposit volume) for one-year ruble deposits of 100,000 rubles was 6.4% pa on July 1, for deposits of 700,000 rubles - 6.5%. The average (non-weighted) interest rate for deposits of 100,000 rubles was 8.4%, of 700,000 - 8.7%.
"Therefore interest on ruble deposits neared their pre-crisis reference point - the level of inflation," the agency said.
The first half also brought a drop in the share of deposits in foreign currency - from 26.4% at the start of the year to 21.5% on July 1.