The Ministry of Finance and the Bank of Russia are proposing to return to the idea of creating a full-fledged market for non-state pension funds (NPFs) and to unfreeze the pension savings of Russians by privatizing them. Vedomosti writes about this with reference to the report of departments submitted to the government on August 30. Anatoly Aksakov, Chairman of the State Duma Committee on the Financial Market, confirmed the information about the authenticity of the report.
We are talking about the so-called funded part of the pension, which was formed by the Russians before the freeze in 2014. Before freezing 6 p.p. of the insurance tariff, 22% went to the funded part – it was assumed that this money would be a growth driver for the NPF market. Citizens could dispose of the funded part of the pension more freely: transfer it from the State Pension Fund (PFR) to the NPF, independently choose a management company.
The freezing of the funded part actually put an end to this market, as it turned out to be closed on itself: there was no new inflow of funds after the freeze, and the only source of liquidity for NPFs is money from investing in these savings. An additional complication was that, under these conditions, NPFs were not interested in long-term investments, since clients demanded annual interest reports.
Now the Ministry of Finance and the Central Bank want to “privatize” the frozen pension savings, that is, to return the Russians the right to dispose of this money, but without the right to withdraw funds from their accounts. The authorities believe that this will create a market for "long money", which is so necessary for investment. Now the funds are practically in state ownership, which they want to get rid of by returning them to the market channel. A separate innovation is to give citizens the opportunity to manage their savings (that is, invest them) according to special criteria of the authorities, but these criteria have not yet been determined.
In order to solve the problem of lack of liquidity in the NPF system, it is proposed to expand the capabilities of the entire system, which will include: the development of corporate pension programs, the creation of NPF incentives for long-term investments, the modernization of investment instruments for individuals, tax incentives, and the introduction of a long-term savings guarantee system.
At the moment, 4.5 trillion rubles are “mothballed” in the NPF system. The additional pension income of Russians after the introduction of measures, according to the estimates of the Central Bank and the Ministry of Finance, will grow from 8% in 2022 to 9.1% by 2025 and up to 10.8% by 2030.
On Wednesday, September 7, it became known that the Russian authorities are in a difficult situation, as the current model of economic development turned out to be incapacitated under the sanctions. The Ministry of Finance and the Central Bank are proposing a change in approach and are in favor of a more market-based approach, without which, in their opinion, Russia will not be able to return to stable economic growth. The creation of a market for "long money" that can be invested in investment projects was one of the main points of their proposals. The NPF market can become one of the sources of these funds.