Minister: Govt investment should encourage market only in crisis

MOSCOW, Jan 15 (PRIME) -- Government investment should be used to encourage the market only in crisis periods, there should not be too much state interference as it precludes private investment, Russia’s Finance Minister Anton Siluanov said at the Gaidar Forum on Friday.

“In difficult times like we had last year, state investment should, of course, increase to become the accelerator for support and growth. But one should not overdo it, because the source for the investment is market debt. We attracted liquidity that should have been used for the private sector, for the private economy,” he said.

“When we speak about state investment, one should not get carried away with such ideas, because they preclude hinder private investment.”

Normalization of budget policies after the crisis will become a challenge for the Western economies as their debts increased much, and the situation may impact Russia as well, Siluanov also said, adding that Russia wants to normalize its budget policy until 2022.

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