Chapter 10 Yeltsin's Dilemma
Among all the ministerial agencies in the Soviet Union, the Ministry of Foreign Trade and Economic Cooperation used to be the only one with its own banking system. But now the Ministry of Construction of the Soviet Union is about to end this history, because their National Residential Bank will be renamed the Residential Utilities Bank to become the fifth state-owned bank in the Soviet Union, and its first president will be the original President of the National Residential Bank. Buchak.
The banking reform this time is the first step of the Gorbachev government's reform of the financial system. Although the Residential Utilities Bank has been raised to the national level, it is still a regional bank only for Moscow, Leningrad and Gorky in terms of capital. And it was also a bold experiment by Gorbachev in the banking system.
As Gorbachev's confidant and an official with a lot of research in finance, Seryozha still knows a thing or two about these things. In fact, not only residential and public utility banks are on Gorbachev's plan, but also a state-owned bank called Industrial and Agricultural Bank has also been listed on the agenda for financial system reform. That is, in the future. The banking system of the Soviet Union will have the existing Central Bank, Foreign Trade Bank, Construction Bank, and Savings Bank expand from four to six, and the Industrial and Agricultural Bank and the Housing and Public Utilities Bank will join in. Gorbachev's move is to promote the country's housing and urban construction and improve the situation of declining industrial and agricultural production year by year. It also means that in the future, housing and urban construction as well as industrial and agricultural enterprises will receive more financial support from the state. As the second in command among the state leaders, Ligachev, the second in command of the Secretariat of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union, undertook the reform of the financial system.
Ligachev had previously served as the head of the party's organization department, and he was very prestigious in the party. However, Seryozha now indirectly holds the money bag of the Soviet Union, and Ligachev is not very familiar with foreign trade business, so Ligachev did not interfere too much with Seryozha's affairs, but Yeltsina On the other hand, Ligachev was a little dissatisfied because the workers' new city required a huge budget from the central government.
Ligachev’s idea is very simple. Why did the workers’ new city be built in three phases without relying on the state to allocate a penny when it was in the hands of Sergey Sha, but you Yeltsin asked the state so much when you took over money. Therefore, Yeltsin's funds have not been met.
In fact, Xie Liaosha knew in his heart that due to the shortage of domestic supply in the past few years, the common people have become more dependent on the black market. However, due to the nature of the Soviet Union, the workers will get paid no matter what. This actually exacerbates the harm of inflation, because the supply is decreasing, and the money in the hands of ordinary people becomes more and more because they cannot be spent. The harm brought about by inflation is to make ordinary people look down on the interest on the bonds issued by residential and public utility banks. Ordinary people would rather exchange their money for some durable and timeless goods and hoard them, or exchange them for foreign exchange. Only in this way can they preserve their wealth. This has invisibly aggravated the demand for supply and worsened the shortage of supply. People with connections can get the goods that are in short supply, while those without connections can only go to the black market to buy high-priced goods. The common people also hate this phenomenon deeply. This reminded Seryozha of a vocabulary he had heard when he was very young, called speculation.
Under the influence of the shortage economy of the Soviet Union, speculation magnified the harmful side, gradually showing a more serious impact on the Soviet economy. Even the barter trade that Seryozha had in his hands to transfuse the Soviet Union had a greater impact. Take electrolytic aluminum, one of the three main businesses of Glencore, as an example. Workers who were unable to buy satisfactory daily necessities in state-run stores due to inflation began to buy commodities on the black market with enough money. Show magic. Some people will steal the aluminum ingots produced from their workplaces and sell them to smugglers outside, while others simply go outside to do some part-time jobs during working hours to subsidize their families.
What's more, some well-connected people relied on the big trees of the electrolytic aluminum plant to engage in speculative business. As a result, the output of aluminum ingots in the factory began to decline, and production costs began to rise. But when it came to Serezha, the harm brought about was the shrinking of trade caused by the shortage of commodities and the decline of profits caused by rising costs.
After understanding this truth, Seryozha now sees through it. Unless it returns to the way it was when Secretary Andropov first came to power, the police went to the streets to catch workers who skipped work, otherwise, the Soviet economy really couldn't change the downward trend. But what Gorbachev did was exactly the opposite. He wanted to give the people freedom, but he definitely would not let the police do that.
This is not the only bad news. Due to the downturn in the global economy, the prices of aluminum ingots, oil and natural gas in the international market are all falling. Fortunately, the price of food is also falling. Although Glencore's profit model has no effect, the export revenue of the Soviet Union is not optimistic.
The business of the Ministry of Foreign Trade and Economic Cooperation is not easy to do, but Seryozha has made cars a new export highlight. So for the time being, the business data on Seriosha's side are not too ugly. But Yeltsin couldn't start work without money. Sergey had promised Yeltsin at the beginning, so Yeltsin had the cheek to ask Sergey to solve the financial problem for him.
"Brother, our foreign trade bank's money is the profits of export companies, and it has to be settled every quarter. I embezzled the money to you, and it took several years for your worker's new city to return the funds. How can you ask me to help you! "Seryozha said helplessly.
"Brother, you have to think of a way for me! Well, GRD Ligachev doesn't care about it, and keeps letting me find a way to solve the problem. Now there is no one interested in the bonds of the residential utility bank, brother, you But experts in this field, if you don’t take action, brother, my first project in Moscow will be ruined!” Yeltsin said anxiously.
"Brother Boris, don't worry! There are ways, but it's impossible to raise the money domestically! If we borrow money from foreign financial institutions, there may be some hope!" Sergey Sha He said cautiously that during this period of time, he has been having a headache on how to make the funds on the books of the Foreign Trade Bank flow between countries, but now it seems that Yeltsin, who is about to go crazy, is tortured by Ligachev. Candidates.
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