OREANDA-NEWS. February 2, 2009. The Central Bank of the Russian Federation decided to raise effective February 2, 2009 rates for lombard credits and repo transactions in order to curb inflation and provide stability to the ruble. CBR said in a press release that the interest rate for lombard credits for the term of one calendar day was set at 11% (10% earlier); 11% (10% earlier) for 7 calendar days in case when two latest lombard credit auctions for 2 weeks (14 calendar days) were declared invalid and 11% (10.25% earlier) for 30 calendar days.

The monetary authority set the following interest rates for direct repo transactions to be executed at fixed rates: 11% for a day (10% earlier) and 11% for 7 days (10% earlier). Last Friday CBR head Sergey Ignatiev said the central bank would do its utmost to prevent the ruble from sliding against the bi-currency basket below RUB 41.00 by means of interventions on the FX market and amending interest rate policies.