FACTBOX-Russia's banks struggle with bad loans

MOSCOW, July 1 (Reuters) - Russian bank profits could be erased in 2009 if bad loans rise to 10 percent of credit portfolios.

Following are the latest news items on this issue and links to Reuters stories covering recent government and industry forecasts for the banking industry.

GOVERNMENT AND CENTRAL BANK FORECASTS

June 30, 2009 - Russia will spend 210 billion roubles ($6.75 billion) or around 0.5 percent of its 2010 GDP on recapitalising the banking system via OFZ treasury bills, Finance Minister Alexei Kudrin says.

June 29 - Russian Prime Minister Vladimir Putin tells state banks to boost lending by around $15 billion over the next three months as bad loans rise [ID:nLT723598]

June 26 - Central bank Chairman Sergei Ignatyev says the chances of the country facing a second wave of banking crisis were "negligible". [ID:nLQ404794]

June 22 - Ignatyev has said bad loans and stagnation on credit markets were his main tasks in the mid term. [ID:nLM6450]

June 19 - Russia plans to cut off recapitalisation funds to all but its biggest banks under a new draft law. [ID:nLJ220449]

June 9 - Stress tests showed the outlook for non-performing loans as of year-end 2009 improving slightly from forecasts given three months before, the head of the central bank's banking supervision department Alexei Simanovsky said. [ID:nL9304302]

June 7 - Russian officials sent mixed signals about the health of the country's banks, first denying, then admitting stress testing has been carried out and giving differing answers about what it showed. [ID:nL6109314]

June 5 - Russian President Dmitry Medvedev ruled out creating a 'bad bank' to clean up failed loans. [ID:nL534983]

May 22 - The share of non-performing loans may climb to 20 percent by the end of 2009, Russian deposit insurance agency chief Alexander Turbanov said, in the gloomiest forecast from officials to date. [ID:nLM954063]

May 20 - Russia's banks will need at least $15.65 billion of extra capital if non-performing loans stand at 10-12 percent this year, Alexei Simanovsky said. [ID:nLK55866]

April 6 - Russian bank assets shrank for the first time in more than three years in February, while bad loans rose 94.5 billion roubles to 2.8 percent of the total credit portfolio, data showed. [ID:nL6670400]

March 25 - Russian banks can count on further state help should bad loans rise to 10 percent, forcing them to make provisions of $45 billion, officials said. The central bank said recapitalisation is still preferred to a bad bank.[ID:nLP675712]

BANKER AND ANALYST COMMENTS