Suren Karayan: Anti-Russian sanctions in the short term do not threaten Armenia

ArmInfo. Anti-Russian sanctions in  the short term do not threaten Armenia, the acting president said.  Minister of Economic Development and Investments of Armenia Suren  Karayan on April 12 during a briefing for journalists, touching upon  the possible negative impact of the latest sanctions against the  Russian Federation.

Nevertheless, according to Karajan, Armenia  closely follows the sanctions process, as Russia is Armenia's largest  trading partner. "The first thing that can have a direct impact on us  is the volatility of the Russian ruble, which in the short term does  not pose a threat to us, but we monitor the processes, consult with  our Russian colleagues and keep this issue in the center of  attention," he said. Karayan. At this stage, as noted. Minister,  discussions are being held with Armenian exporters, which are  fulfilling their contractual obligations with their Russian partners  in rubles. If necessary, as Suren Karayan assured, the government  uses the necessary tools to assist.

On April 6, the United States imposed new sanctions against Russia on  sanctions that spread to two dozen Russian businessmen, oligarchs and  officials. This caused the collapse of the quotations of securities  of many Russian companies and banks, including those not affected by  new sanctions, as well as a sharp weakening of the ruble against the  dollar and the euro. Companies of some of them are represented in  Armenia. Against the background of the collapse of the Russian ruble,  the Armenian foreign exchange market found itself in a "turbulence  zone" due to a significant degree of correlation between the  economies of Armenia and Russia.

According to the market participants interviewed by ArmInfo, after  the introduction of the next US sanctions against Russia, many  Russian rubles accumulated in the retail foreign exchange market of  Armenia, which are illiquid due to the depreciation, while at the  same time there is a dollar deficit. As a consequence, speculative  demand for US currency has increased significantly. As a result,  experts believe, the dram to ruble began to strengthen, while  weakening noticeably against the dollar and the euro. But experts  believe that as long as the devaluation of the dram to the dollar is  within the limits, which do not cause much concern, since there is no  sharp drop in the national currency rate. This speculative trend, as  experts suggest, will last a maximum of a week, after which the  situation will stabilize, and then the "rollback" of the exchange  rate to its previous positions is not ruled out.