The Russian Ministry of Finance will facilitate the terms of sale of Federal Loan Bonds (OFZ) for the population. According to Deputy Head of the department Sergey Storchak, this decision is caused by the impossibility of developing the bond market in the existing conditions.
"The market has exhausted itself. We have lapped up the cream, there is nowhere else to go," he stressed.
He noted that for the moment, it is necessary to facilitate the conditions for the population to use this instrument. ”Our citizens have accumulated experience, there has been an advertisement, maybe once again, we will launch an advertising campaign. The banks have also accumulated experience. Then we are going to free citizens from a need to pay a commission to banks. All these measures, maybe, will increase the demand, " Storchak believes.
He explained that the Ministry of Finance is expanding the range of agent banks selling OFZs for the population from two to four by including in the list the Pochta Bank and Promsvyazbank.
"We will expand the number of banks - there were two banks (Sberbank and VTB 24), and will be four. We will add the Pochta Bank and Petr Fradkov’s bank - Promsvyazbank. They have a lot of branches. The Pochta Bank has been working with us for a long time in the field of financial education. The cooperation with the Ministry of Finance on OFZ is a natural task, "TASS quotes the deputy head of the Russian Ministry of Finance as saying.
According to him, the main stimulus for increasing demand for OFZ will be further lowering of the interest rates in the deposit market.
”If there are fewer deposits, the attractiveness of OFZ will increase," Storchak said, adding that the management of financial organizations also expects to increase demand for bonds among the population.
