MOSCOW, December 23. /TASS/. Russian President Vladimir Putin called the current policy of Russian financial authorities "the golden standard" and noted that the volume of lending does not decline, despite the increase in the key rate of the Bank of Russia, Russian President Vladimir Putin said at the annual press conference answering a question from TASS.

"I believe that we are generally able to find ‘the golden standard’. Why? What threats are there from raising interest rates? Growth restrictions. We need to ensure growth above the global 3-4% in the near future, even 4.4-4.5%. It would be nice. Increasing interest rates reduces the possibility of this. But we don’t see this yet, because the volume of lending is not declining, the capabilities of the banking system are growing. Sberbank alone has a trillion rubles of profit this year. So, in general, for the moment a ‘golden standard’ has been found," Putin said.

At the most recent meeting on December 17, the Bank of Russia for the seventh time in a row raised the key rate, this time by 1 percentage point to 8.5% per annum. The regulator noted that inflation is higher than the October forecast, which may lead to a more significant and prolonged deviation of inflation upward from the target.

Governor of the Bank of Russia Elvira Nabiullina said earlier that the profit of the Russian banking sector by the end of 2021 could reach a record 2.5 trillion rubles ($34.04 bln), and this is another source of capital and lending growth.