Russian Finance Minister Says Country Can Use Domestic Borrowing Instead Of External Loans

The Russian Finance Ministry will be choosing the sources of financing of the budget's deficit in a flexible manner and might avoid external borrowing and use domestic loans instead, Finance Minister Anton Siluanov told reporters on Thursday.

MOSCOW (UrduPoint News / Sputnik - 20th September, 2018) The Russian Finance Ministry will be choosing the sources of financing of the budget's deficit in a flexible manner and might avoid external borrowing and use domestic loans instead, Finance Minister Anton Siluanov told reporters on Thursday.

Many experts have mentioned the possible imposition of US sanctions on the Russian public debt as the worst case scenario.

"We cannot say now if sanctions will be imposed on the [Russian public] debt: they either will [be imposed] or will not be, what kind of sanctions it will be. In any case, we can abandon foreign borrowing and replace it by domestic sources of financing the deficit," Siluanov said.

He added that it was planned to borrow a total of 1.5 trillion rubles ($22.5 billion) on the domestic market in 2019.