Experts predict the recurrence of 2011 crisis in Belarus

Independent experts find that the latest activities of the Belarusian authorities will cause the recurrence of the last year’s crisis.

According to economist Leonid Zlotnikov, new crisis can happen namely due to the authorities’ resistance to privatize, due to the cancellation of customs free export of dissolvents and due to the loans obligation.

The expert explaine that the cancellation of customs free export of dissolvents has already caused the collapse of Belarus’ international trade balance in July and later on it "will result in the reduction of currency inflow into the country, and inevitably will cause the rise of Dollar exchange rate," as Belarus Partisan reports.

"The increase of Dollar exchange rate will consequently cause the reduction of ruble deposits, inflation, and, since we are in the situation, when if there is no international powerup, it will cause something similar to what happened in 2011," forecasts Leonid Zlotnikov.

Financial analyst of Alpari official partner in Minsk Vadim Iossub agrees with Leonid Zlotnikov, but he thinks that the preconditions for crisis reoccurrence are more contributed by the advancing of wage rate growth over the growth of production volume, as Komsomolskaya Pravda reports.

"It seems that they are forgetting the lesson of 2010, which taught us that real income growth cannot be provided by emission, it can only be earned. To be more precise, they can try and even at some point demonstrate the growth, but afterwards that growth would be leveled out by the increase of the price level and foreign exchange rate. We are already witnessing the increase of the price level. Dollar and currency basket have returned to the level of January this year," states the expert.

The economist also point out that these were not only dissolvents and dilutants that caused the export decrease, but also mineral fertilizers and machinery.

"Therefore, a potentially dangerous situation is building up on the exchange market. Foreign exchange supply, facilitated by export, decrease begins to drop down, whereas, foreign exchange demand, because of income growth, can rise. We will not experience the total deficit in foreign exchange thanks to flexible exchange rate. But there is a strong chance for us to face devaluation," said Vadim Iossub.

He also mentioned the reduction of the refinancing rate, which caused the decrease in number of ruble deposits. According to the analyst, the National Bank of Belarus, will probably have to raise the base rate.