Section II. Propagation of the Crisis to Real Sector and Economic Security.
During recent years, the idea of importance of financial sector in promoting economic
growth and development has become more wide spread in the economic literature (see, for
example, A. Demirguc-Kunt et al., 2008). A well-functioning developed financial system is
considered to be essential for country’s economic development since it helps allocate scarce
resources more effectively, notably, by financing the worthy investment projects, and to
reduce information asymmetry. Therefore, from this point of view, countries with
underdeveloped financial systems have to reform them in order to create a good environment
for investment and, thus, to boost the economic growth.
The history of repetitive financial crises all over the world during the last century had
made economists to become interested in effects of such crises on the real economy. In fact,
one can observe that financial instability can compromise the mechanism of financing, which
is crucial for the country’s economic performance (B. Bernanke, 2007, F. Mishkin, 2007). In
this Section we study some possible effects of financial crisis on the real economy in general,
accompanied by some examples from transition countries.
First of all, if we consider the financial sector as the part of the “real economy”, one
can notice a direct negative effect of financial crisis in massive lay-offs or, at least, in
recruitment freezes in financial-services industry. Growing unemployment negatively affects
current consumption and, thus, local production. While considering a major role of financial
intermediation played by banks and other financial non-banking institutions, financial distress
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has an impact on the components of global demand. Due to the worldwide liquidity crisis
5
,
domestic financial intermediaries are forced to contract their supply of credit and to raise loan
interest rates as their resources of funding become less available and/or more expensive. This
credit contraction hurts, first of all, innovative and risky investment projects, but also
expansion projects and global investment in general. High interest rates on mortgage credits
and consumer credits for durable goods reduce demand on such goods. That is the reason why
construction sector, real estate market, automobile industry, commerce are the most affected
sectors by the current global economic crisis. A sharp decrease in demand could provoke the
fall in the prices for these goods, and collaterals could loose in part their value what will
influence negatively banks’ credit supply. Due to the worldwide economic slow-down, the
demand for the export goods is also decreasing, provoking the fall of prices. That is
particularly true for the commodities markets. The exposure to such risks is more important
for the countries with undiversified economies deeply involved in the international trade. By
the time of financial instability, public expenditure is also attended due to fiscal entries
reducing and the necessity of the bail-out operations of financial institutions and state
enterprises. The global demand’s decrease causes inevitably the decline in production and
economic activity.
Thus, the crisis started as the financial one due to the exposure to global risks (via the
capital and current account of the balance of payment and via the integration of the domestic
financial market to global capital market) has spread to the real sector. Consequently, the
economic security is affected not only in the financial field but also in other dimensions of
country’s economic activity. We could easily find some illustrations of these phenomena in
the case of the current economic crisis in transition economies.
Modern financial systems of transition countries were born from the complex process
of transformation of “monobank” system into the two-tier banking systems and from the
creation of “de novo” stock exchange markets and non-banking financial intermediaries.
These financial systems are still under development compared to financial systems of
developed countries. They are characterized by large interest rates spreads and fragile
depositors’ confidence. These systems are bank-based with a large number of banks and the
existence of so called “pocket banks” as the consolidation process is not yet achieved. A
regulatory system had to be established while the liberalization process had already been
launched.
In order to reduce the existing gap in the financial sphere and to catch up with
developed countries, transition economies have experienced very rapid credit growth during
the 2000s. This process was facilitated by growing demand for natural resources, high
commodities prices at the world market and low interest rates at the international capital
market. For instance, the private credit to GDP grew from 11.2% in 2000 to 48.1% of GDP in
2006 in the Republic of Kazakhstan, and from 13.3% in 2000 to 31% of GDP in the Russian
Federation (EBRD Transition report, 2007). The household lending (including mortgage
lending) quasi-inexistent in the beginning of the 2000s has also expanded rapidly. These
growing actives of banks were in a large part financed by foreign borrowings (more than 50%
of total borrowing in Kazakhstan and around 18% of total borrowing in Russia). Liquidity
crisis started in 2007 had and continues to have the severe consequences on the servicing of
the foreign debt, refinancing of these loans requiring high interest rates. For this reason, banks
charged the growing resources costs to their clients by increasing massively loan rates and, in
some cases, by stopping their lending activities. The construction sector in Kazakhstan and
Russia is also regarded as one of most affected by the crisis. The “freezing” of construction
sites in these countries left households who had bought apartments without possibility to
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More the domestic financial system is integrated into the global financial system, more it is dependant on
external sources, more it is vulnerable to external shocks.
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obtain them. Therefore, the situation has resulted in the massive lay-offs in the construction
sector that also have negatively affected the neighboring economies such as Tajikistan and the
Kyrgyz Republic by reducing the remittances flows to these countries. Besides, the financial
crisis is progressively spreading to other real sectors of economy.
Moreover, it is important to underline that the small and medium enterprises (SME),
which play an important role in the employment, production and economic development of
industrialized, emerging and developing countries, are more seriously affected by the global
financial crisis than the larges companies.
As one can observe on the example of the current crisis, external shocks transferred by
financial systems is very damaging and violent for the real economy of transition countries.
This sensibility to external shocks (via different channels) of domestic financial systems can
be explained by relative youngness of these systems, by too rapid liberalization (internal and
external) and by the lack of regulation, and represents a weak link if the economic security of
transition countries. Nevertheless, the present crisis could have also a positive effect on the
further development of financial sectors in transition countries by breaking a “bad
equilibrium” of too high dependence on external financing and of concentrated banks’
portfolio loans, and, therefore, by forcing them to attract domestic savings (as it was the case
after the collapse of 1998 in Russia, which forced the banks to turn to credit the economy
instead of investments in State securities).
Since the financial distress could have a deep impact on the real sector, it is necessary
for governments to maintain an adequate level of financing in the economy. This can be
achieved by using “good financial governance” measures implemented by different domestic
institutions which should play an even more important role during the crisis.
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