Questionable sources in Russia

Liquidity constraints threaten to drive Russian businesses to seek finance from the criminal sector. Eugene Vorotnikov in St Petersburg assesses the risk

Russian businesses could return to widespread borrowing from criminal sources in any repeat of the 2008-09 recession and credit crunch, the country’s financial watchdog has warned as continuing global turmoil hits interbank lending. “We are facing a situation where criminal capital is increasingly being used for lending to business, thereby replacing the legal banking sector,” said Yury Chikhanchin, head of the federal financial monitoring Service, Rosfinmonitoring.