(Read the full article on TASS.RU)
Inflation worries the Bank of Russia very much, the rigidity in monetary policy will have to be maintained for now, said the head of the regulator Elvira Nabiullina, speaking at a meeting of the Association of European Businesses (AEB).
“Today, inflation worries us a lot. It has doubled our target of 4%, we raised the rate, and we expect for now that we will have to maintain strict policy in order to bring inflation back to the target,” she said.
Nabiullina stressed that if inflation is not returned to the target now, the expectations of people are not changed, then the economy will find itself in an inflationary spiral that cannot be stopped.
In October, the Board of Directors of the Central Bank of the Russian Federation raised the key rate for the sixth time in a row – from 6.75% to 7.5% per annum and signaled its likely increase at the next meetings.
The head of the regulator Elvira Nabiullina also did not rule out that in December this year the key rate could be increased by 1 percentage point. The next meeting of the Board of Directors of the Bank of Russia, which will consider the issue of the level of the key rate, is scheduled for December 17, 2021.
Large-scale anti-crisis measures to support economic sectors should already be completed, it is necessary to move to targeted measures, said the head of the Bank of Russia.
“The recovery is not uniform, new waves of the pandemic may lead to the introduction of new restrictions affecting different sectors of the economy. But large-scale anti-crisis measures should already be completed, they are replaced by more targeted ones, helping specifically the affected people and companies,” she said.