Russia is planning to raise $7 billion in the international debt markets next year, taking advantage of strong demand, the country's finance minister told CNBC Friday. "We are preparing to return next year to the level of participation in international markets that we saw in 2013, before all these crises, with the sanctions and with the crisis in the economy. This will be in the region of $7 billion," Anton Siluanov told CNBC in Moscow. "We need, in our view, to have a presence, to have a permanent presence on the international markets," he later added. Emerging market issuance of Eurobonds — debt issued in a foreign currency — has risen as oil-exporting countries look to boost their public finances in the face of low commodity prices. Russia, which is one of the world's biggest crude-producing countries, successfully placed a $1.25 billion 10-year Eurobond top-up on Thursday, according to media reports. The reference yield was 3.99 percent. This followed on from an original placement in May of $1.75 billion that met with high demand of $7 billion, according to media reports. Demand for emerging market bonds has been boosted by the meager yields available for bonds in advanced economies, due to pervasive low or negative base rates and very low inflation. "Yesterday's Eurobond issue really showed that investors believe in Russia; investors are prepared to buy Russian securities," Siluanov told CNBC. "We have created a good and attractive infrastructure, which foreign investors trust in and we will be working in the future with our banks, our clearing depositaries, for borrowing on the overseas markets. They are in no way less effective than western institutions," he later added. The Russian economy has slowed steadily since 2010 and shrunk on-the-year in 2015. It has been hit by international sanctions levied against Moscow after its annexation of Crimea in 2014 and involvement in a pro-Russian uprising in Ukraine, as well as the drop in the oil price. Poverty has increased and inflation remains high, standing at 6.9 percent year-on-year in August, although it has slowed from a peak near 17 percent last year. "In the next three-year budget, we are planning to reduce our deficits," Siluanov added. "This is important in order to protect our reserves, the reserve funds that were accumulated in previous years when oil prices were high and in order not to substantially increase borrowing on the domestic and international markets," he continued later. Topping up May's issue increased the overall attractiveness of the Russian Eurobond market to investors by improving liquidity, the country's deputy finance minister told CNBC. "We are glad that we managed to fulfill our obligations for our investors. We really understand that for any of them, it is a different story whether you have both issues worth $3 billion or less than $2 billion, because the liquidity of this issue will increase and clearly it will help us in meeting demand," Sergey Storchak told CNBC on Friday in Moscow. He said it was preferable for Russia to raise debt in rubles where possible, however. "In terms of the budget process, we still belief that there is no huge need to be on a permanent basis in the external bond markets. As any nation with deep local markets, we of course prefer to issue ruble instruments of different dimensions and different sizes," Storchak told CNBC. Two other major oil-producing countries, Nigeria and Saudi Arabia, plan to place Eurobonds this year. Saudi Arabia's issue is due next month and will be the first the country has launched on the international market. The deal may top the $16.5 billion record set by Argentina earlier this year as the biggest issued by an emerging market sovereign. With regards to Nigeria's prospective issue, the country's Finance Minister Kemi Adeosun told CNBC Africa last week that investors had shown interest "even without (the government) asking." The economies of both Russia and Nigeria are set to contract this year. Finance ministers in both countries are considering privatizing state-owned assets in order to boost finances. However, this plan has stalled in Russia due to its recession and the sanctions imposed on Russian individuals and companies with close ties to the Kremlin. The International Monetary Fund sees the Russian economy shrinking by 1.2 percent in 2016, before returning to growth in 2017. This month, S&P Global Ratings upgraded its outlook on the Russia's credit rating to "stable" from "negative." "External risks to Russia have abated to a significant extent, while the country's economy continues to adjust to the dual shocks of a lower oil price environment and sanctions imposed by the European Union and the U.S.," S&P said in a report on the revision. Source: CNBC
