Financial Pulse: economic activity on course to speed up in May as curbs gradually lifted
Economic activity in late April was persistently lower its pre-virus levels. The expected gradual easing in May of previously implemented nationwide and global restrictions is set to help a progressive recovery in domestic and external demand. These findings are reported in the fifth issue of Financial Pulse, a weekly analytical review.
Despite the stubbornly low growth, there are reasons to expect a weakening in the impact of temporary proinflationary factors in the near future. This is suggested by stabilising inflation expectations and weekly consumer price indexes, as well as a decline in selling prices of the services sector seen in April.
Between late April and early May, the Bank of Russia continued its efforts to improve banks’ access to liquidity. Also, the regulator was focused on monitoring the progress of household and corporate loan restructuring and of new loan disbursements including loans for payroll.
The Bank of Russia proposed that the Government extend the measures in place to support leaseholders and lessors operating in the worst-hit sectors to unit investment funds acting as lessors.
