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UPCOMING WEBINAR - CAUCASUS AND CENTRAL ASIA: ECONOMIC UPSWINGS AND POL...

Uzbekistan repairing airport for the Taliban
RUSSIA / FSU POLITICS · In Brief · 24 Dec 2021

On December 18 it was reported that the former Soviet republic has sent engineers to Mazar e Sharif, Afghanistan. The airport has been closed for several months. Work on the airport is due finish in early 2002. The country has suffered a brain drain since the Taliban took over in August 2021.Uzbe...

IMF lends USD 558 million to Moldova
RUSSIA / FSU POLITICS · In Brief · 23 Dec 2021

On December 21 the announcement was made that the loan will be given to help the country lift its economy out of the pandemic-driven trough. USD 80 million of the loan was released on the day of the announcement. This is a badly needed cash injection. Moldova is 44th out of the 45th European econ...

It is Thursday, so the 1-week depo rate goes higher again
HUNGARY · In Brief · 23 Dec 2021

At today's regular 1-week deposit tender, the MNB set the fixed interest rate, at which it accepted unlimited bids as usual, at 3.8%, up 20 bps from last week's level. So far, this rate, which is the effective sterilisation rate , has been raised at each week's tender since the sterilisation rate...

Next year's fiscal deficit target lowered to 4.9% of GDP
HUNGARY · In Brief · 23 Dec 2021

Rather than going home to decorate the Christmas tree or completing the selection of gifts for the kids, people in the Finance Ministry and up on the Castle Hill of Budapest appear to be still busy working.Yesterday's second important announcement, from the Finance Ministry, said that based on a ...

Would Petro be a transformer, or a disrupter?
COLOMBIA · Report · 22 Dec 2021 · 1 response

Loans disbursed in December 2020 deteriorated much faster than those granted before the pandemic. It looks as though the end of 2020 marked the peak in the speed of credit quality deterioration. Loans disbursed in July 2021 seem marginally better, in terms of quality deterioration, than those dis...

The End of the Spending Cap and the Budget for 2022
BRAZIL ECONOMICS · Report · 22 Dec 2021

The approval of the budget for 2022 made obvious what observers already knew. The spending cap rule was shattered, but not only to help the poorest households. The creation of the Auxílio Brasil program to replace Bolsa Família was the Trojan horse of the battle over spending. The moratorium on p...

Government cabinet decided to halt the rise of interest rates on households' mortgage loans
HUNGARY · In Brief · 22 Dec 2021

Today, the government cabinet decided to freeze the interest rates of existing (= not new) variable-rate mortgage loans at the end-October, 2021 level for the whole of H1 2022. This means that banks will not be able to charge more than this level even if the loan contract allowed them to do so.Po...

Industrial output up by 5.2% y-o-y in 11M21
RUSSIA ECONOMICS · In Brief · 22 Dec 2021

Rosstat reported that industrial output increased y-o-y by 5.3% and 5.2% in November and 11M21. As regularly happened in 2020 and 2021, statistics for the preceding month were revised up. This revision was quite significant as, for instance, previously reported y-o-y October growth in manufacturi...

Yuan may appreciate further in 2022, but not hit 6 to the dollar
CHINA · Report · 22 Dec 2021

Growth continues to be weak. In November, industrial output grew 3.8% y/y, down 1.1 pps from Q3, much lower than the growth rates of recent years. Investment is also low, and was up 7.9% y/y, and down 1.2 pps from January-June. Its adjusted growth rate is instead negative. The real estate market ...

The political winds blow hot and cold for President Lasso
ECUADOR · Report · 22 Dec 2021

The Comptroller General exonerated President Lasso from any involvement in the Pandora papers. In this context, the case was archived, and the dark clouds of a possible impeachment blew away. But the relationship with the Assembly is still complicated and even more uncertain than at the beginn...

Is it game over?
PHILIPPINES · In Brief · 22 Dec 2021

Pulse Asia released today the results of its survey of on voters’ presidential preferences conducted in the first week of December. The late dictator’s son, former Senator Ferdinand Marcos, Jr., was the top pick, with a majority (53%) of the respondents saying they will vote for him if elections ...

​The indexation scheme: some tentative scenarios
TURKEY · In Brief · 21 Dec 2021 · 3 responses

The Ministry of Treasury and Finance released a one-pager today (link here; in Turkish) providing a bit more detail on the planned F/X-indexation scheme. As we wrote yesterday, and it is now widely available in open media sources, the scheme aims to protect TL deposits against exchange rate-drive...

Consumer credit growth decelerated sharply amid a strong increase of household deposits in November – well before the recent key rate hike
RUSSIA ECONOMICS · In Brief · 21 Dec 2021

Central Bank of Russia reported that the total credit to households grew by a mere 0.9% m-o-m in November, having decelerated sharply from 1.6% m-o-m in October and average monthly 2.0% seen in 2Q21 and 3Q21. At the same time, household deposits in November increased by 1.7% m-o-m, having fallen ...

Monetary policy considerations
PHILIPPINES · In Brief · 21 Dec 2021

Although central banks around the world pursued similar strategies of pouring monies into their economies in the wake of the pandemic, it is clear from their divergent moves this year that there is no one-size-fits-all exit strategy. With the most-watched central bank, the US Fed, signaling readi...

Politics: Opposition mired in internal crises and low approval, despite poor AMLO results
MEXICO · Report · 20 Dec 2021

Mexico is experiencing several economic and political negative effects as a result of President Andrés Manuel López Obrador’s failed policies. Yet the two main opposition parties, the Institutional Revolutionary Party (PRI) and the National Action Party (PAN) are bogged down in multifaceted crise...