Privatization Program for 2014-2016: Formal Shifts and Uncertain Prospects

Abstract

The outcome of the current privatization program, to be completed this year, will strongly depend on the general situation in the Russian economy, and in particular on the behavior of the domestic stock market. In the explanatory documents a ached to the draft law on federal budget for 2016 submitted to parliament by the government, it is stated that the revenues from privatization are expected to amount to more than Rb 33.2bn. This goal does not appear to be quite realistic, though. The planned sum of budget revenue to be generated by this source in 2016 is comparable to the total amount of revenue generated by the privatizaion program for 2011–2013 over the entire 3-year period of its implementaion. However, the economic and political situation then was very different from what we have been experiencing over the last two years (massive capital outflow, the introduction of economic sanctions, the ruble’s plummeting exchange rate, and the probability of protracted recession in the national economy).

Keywords: Russian economy, privatization

JEL Classification: H82, K11, L33