2015, we laid foundations for the development of a national rating industry, and the new legislation allows us to expect that a really respectable and professional rating industry will be built in our country. now about the national payment system. in 2015, operations and clearing centre of the npcs was launched. it processes all operations made in russia through cards of international payment systems. the transfer of payments into russia was implemented in a very short period due to external risks but its implementation was of high technological quality in line with international standards. in the end of the last year a pilot issue of national payment system cards mir was implemented. the cards are already issued by banks of the crimea ( and accepted throughout the crimea ) and some other banks. the mass issue of the cards is to start in the second half of the year. besides, we have improved the system of bank of russia financial messaging system, a swift counterpart. it complies with all swift formats and everyone can use this convenient format to transfer messages domestically. we closely cooperate with our colleagues in belarus and kazakhstan in coordinating the development of the national payment systems. some words about countering fictitious transactions. according to our estimates, fictitious transactions have shrunk by about one - third. the monitoring has become more efficient. fictitious transactions in the non - bank sector are better revealed due to, among other things, our thorough inspections we can implement as a megaregulator. in 2015, quite a few unscrupulous players were swept off the market : 93 banks, 96 insurance companies, 21 non - governmental pension funds, 1, 703 microfinance organisations, and 609 professional securities market participants. one of the reasons behind it was servicing the shadow sector of the economy. looking back at the year, i would like to say that it was undoubtedly challenging with external environment constantly changing for the worse, but for all that we have achieved some important results. first, the economy showed its adaptability, and not a passive one. we can see that new sectors, the whole sectors have managed to grow amid an extremely worsened environment. there were also enterprises in the generally failing sectors which took the new possibilities and show potential for development. second, the last year clearly signalled that bis central bankers ’ speeches structural reforms are needed for the economy to return to sustainable growth ; and removing internal restrictions is a short - term objective. i am convinced that we will manage it. thank you for your attention. thank you. bis central bankers ’ speeches

elvira nabiullina : speech at association of russian banks speech by ms elvira nabiullina, governor of the bank of russia, at the annual meeting of the association of russian banks, moscow, 18 february 2021. * * * good afternoon, dear colleagues i am happy to welcome you at the annual meeting of the association of russian banks. at these february meetings, we traditionally sum up the results of the previous year and outline our priorities for the near future. today, we — the economy and society — are at the stage when the system is returning to its normal functioning. this means that we should and are already able to estimate the situation in the banking system after such a stressful year, its robustness and, possibly, hidden risks, as well as what challenges and prospects we can see. another aspect of the current moment is that we are shifting from the anti - crisis mode back to dealing with tasks partially suspended for this difficult period. we should understand the pace and the way how we will be jointly addressing these deferred tasks. these are the topics — results, risks, and priorities — i would like to focus on today. first, i would like to talk about last year ’ s results. anatoly aksakov has just said this word — adequate. i also believe that the banking system has adequately overcome the challenges of 2020. this implies not only that the banking system itself has remained robust, but also that it has fulfilled its mission, providing significant support to the economy, restructuring loans and granting new ones. specific figures are well known, but still i would like to repeat these data again. last year, corporate lending expanded by 10 %, which is nearly two times more than in 2019 before the pandemic. lending to small businesses increased by 20 %. disbursements peaked in spring when businesses desperately needed financial resources and their revenues plummeted. lending was largely a way to support wages and repay loans, and so on. the banking system was thus capable to address this challenge in spring. of course, the government ’ s preferential lending programmes were also of major importance. we can see that mortgage lending surged last year by over 20 %, but i will dwell on this topic later. both preferential mortgage lending programmes and interest rate decreases in the economy in general played a significant role in this respect. consumer lending used to be a matter of our concern before the pandemic, but last year it was growing moderately, in