All news

Tomsk first Russian city to sell municipal bonds raking in 6 mln rubles ($81,000)

The Tomsk Region is the only region in Russia to use this instrument

TOMSK, March 3. /TASS/. Tomsk became the first Russian city to sell municipal bonds raking in more than 6 mln rubles ($81,000) over the last two months, head of the city finance department Irina Yartseva said Thursday.

"No municipality in Russia has issued bonds yet while we have followed the example of the "big brother" [the Tomsk Region administration — TASS] to issue an instrument like that. Bonds worth over 6 mln rubles have been sold," she said.

The Tomsk Region is the only region in Russia to use this instrument. Its regional finance department has sold bonds worth more than 5 bln rubles ($68 mln) since 2002.

According to Yartseva, in end-December 2015 the Tomsk city administration issued 100,000 municipal domestic bonds with fixed coupon yield, par value of 1,000 rubles ($13.6) and 12% yield rate per annum. The instrument is beneficial both to population and the city budget. "Today credit organizations offer a 13-15% yield rate, which is rather high, whereas we offer a 12% rate. By doing this we directly save 1 percentage interest rate for the budget. The population also has benefits as credit organizations offer lower rates," Yartseva said.