Lending to small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs), access to financing alternatives and the prospects of applying platform solutions for reducing businesses’ costs were the key topics discussed by SME associations’ representatives and the Bank of Russia’s management.
Bank of Russia Governor Elvira Nabiullina summed up the results of the SME loan restructuring campaign, emphasising that it was important to not only gradually terminate anti-crisis measures, but also further enhance the banking regulation in the area of small and medium-sized business.
Ms Nabiullina also stressed the role of the ‘green line’ launched during the crisis period — the practice of banks’ communication with entrepreneurs in Russian regions through business associations, specifically OPORA RUSSIA, Delovaya Rossiya (Business Russia) and Russia’s Chamber of Commerce and Industry acting as mediators. The participants in the meeting supported the idea of making this ‘green line’ a permanent mechanism.
Talking of the challenges facing small enterprises, the business associations’ representatives expressed their concerns about unjustified declines to carry out entrepreneurs’ transactions due to the requirements of the anti-money laundering law. The launch of the ‘Know You Customer’ (KYC) platform will help address this issue, and the meeting participants especially focused on the aspects of its development.
Another topic discussed at the meeting was a reduction in small businesses’ costs ensured by the Faster Payments System (FPS).
According to entrepreneurs, the pandemic period has proven that factoring is a highly requested instrument. Now, the question is about its advancement, including by establishing a Masterchain-based online factoring platform for digital financial assets.
The participants in the meeting discussed non-bank sources of financing for SMEs, such as the MOEX Growth Sector and crowdinvesting platforms.
Elvira Nabiullina emphasised that the majority of approaches to expanding SMEs’ access to financial resources involved the development of platform solutions. ‘We will particularly focus on making the transition between these platforms seamless for small businesses and will also analyse how SMEs fit into the services delivered to legal entities by the Digital Profile platform,’ concluded Ms Nabiullina.
This news item was originally published by the Central Bank of the Russian Federation (CBR RU). For more information, see the Source Link.
