Russia: The newly-wed and the nearly dead

June 01, 1999

An extensive audit of 18 Russian commercial banks shows that many bigger ones are - by western standards - clinically dead. International lenders have lost patience. They want to push Russia's central bank and government into a major overhaul of the sector. But they lack the leverage to enforce it. And the central bank lacks the will. John van Schaik reports.

Russian banks ranked by net worth (base case)
	Net worth (Rb m)	Capital/assets
Mezhprombank	374	3%
Probusinessbank	113	12%
Chelindbank	105	14%
Uralvneshtorgbank	-458	-99%
Petrovski	-1,069	-97%
Pomstroibank St Petersburg (ICB)	-1,683	-38%
Bank of Moscow	-4,172	-79%
Vozrozhdenie	-5,974	-133%
Alfa-Bank	-6,287	-78%
Mosbusinessbank	-6,788	-106%
Mezhcombank	-8,403	-475%
Promstroibank Russia	-9,363	-316%
Avtobank	-10,538	-215%
Rossiisky Kredit	-13,905	-125%
Bank Menatep	-16,008	-82%
Unexim Bank	-27,854	-246%
SBS-Agro	-32,310	-184%
Inkombank	-67,434	-450%
*Source: World Bank/Central Bank of Russia*

When crisis hit Russia last August, most analysts expected the country's financial empires to disappear, after all the banking system was insolvent and the central bank had failed to act as lender of last resort.

Russia: The newly-wed and the nearly dead

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