The need to increase the transparency of transactions within the framework of the state defense order has been under discussion in recent years. And the degree of these discussions is by no means diminishing for the reason that colossal funds often go to the left in the implementation of the SDO. The system of so-called kickbacks, gray schemes with the presence of affiliated partners and numerous intermediaries inflicts multibillion-dollar damage to the country's economy. And if we are talking about damage in the defense industry, then the entire security system of Russia is also under attack, which, for obvious reasons, is unacceptable.
To increase transparency in the conclusion of transactions within the framework of the state defense order, the government and the Central Bank presented a new initiative, which, according to the representatives of the banking sector, will soon begin to materialize. What is the innovation?
The fact is that Russian banks participating in the financial operations of the state defense order system, from August 25 of this year, will have to send to the Federal Financial Monitoring Service notifications of all those operations in which defense sector enterprises participate in the SDO format. At the same time, the deadline for submitting such notifications is very short. We are talking about the submission of documentation containing information on the movement of finances on the accounts of all contractors and subcontractors within the SDO, within one working day.
From August 25, 2015, banks must promptly - within one working day - transmit to Rosfinmonitoring information on the movement of funds on the accounts of contractors and subcontractors under the state defense order. This is reported, in particular, by the Central Bank of the Russian Federation. His indication 3731-U dated 2015-15-07 bears the following name:
"On Amending Appendix 8 to the Regulation of the Bank of Russia No. 321-P dated August 29, 2008" On the Procedure for Submitting Information by Credit Institutions to the Authorized Body as Provided for by the Federal Law "On Counteracting Legalization (Laundering) of Criminally Obtained Incomes and Financing of Terrorism "(Comes into force 10 days after the day of its official publication in the Bank of Russia Bulletin).
As the name implies, the instruction has a wide range of applications and concerns not only combating corruption, including in the implementation of the state defense order, but also setting barriers to financial flows that go to the wallets of terrorist organizations.
It would seem that due to the huge number of all kinds of banks and other financial and credit organizations operating in the territory of the Russian Federation, the Federal Financial Monitoring Service simply, by definition, will not be able to track all those transactions on the movement of funds in the accounts of banking entities. However, one should not forget that an important rule applies to participants in the state defense order. Participants do not have the right to open accounts for servicing the state defense order in those financial and credit institutions whose capitalization is below the level of 5 billion rubles. Thus, a company that is ready to undertake obligations to fulfill a certain volume of the state defense order can open an account, for example, with VTB, Gazprombank, Sberbank or other large financial and credit organizations of the Russian Federation. And it is the movement of funds on accounts in these banks (if the movement of funds concerns the implementation of the SDO) that Rosfinmonitoring must control from August 25 - up to settlements with foreign implementers of a certain segment of the SDO.
That is, the chain looks like this: if a company is going to participate in the implementation of a state defense order, then it must open an account with a large Russian bank, and a large Russian bank, in turn, must transmit the full range of information about the movement of funds in this account to the controlling state structure, specifically - the Federal Service for Financial Monitoring. Rosfinmonitoring gets the opportunity to control the operations of transferring funds from account to account, purchasing any securities for these funds, withdrawing and depositing funds to accounts serving the state defense order. Moreover, it should be noted that if, on the basis of the current legislation, the Federal Service for Financial Monitoring had the ability to directly control financial transactions for state defense orders in the amount of 50 million rubles or more, then the innovations will allow Rosfinmonitoring to “monitor” virtually every ruble. The question immediately arises: why is such an opportunity given to the controlling body only now?
But as they say, better late than never …
Are these innovations, which the Russian government and the Central Bank have been working on, to increase the transparency of transactions for the state defense order? If we are guided by the very letter of these innovations, then undoubtedly. However, there are also pitfalls here that should be mentioned. This is the transparency of the banking system in the case of the SDO and the punishment that banks may incur if notifications of transactions with companies implementing SDO projects "suddenly" are late or will not be presented to the regulatory authorities at all. Nothing is known about the punishment yet … In addition, the responsibility of the controlling bodies themselves grows many times over. After all, what a sin to conceal, every regulatory body in our country (and not only in ours) often needs to be monitored, no, no, and given the fact that Rosfinmonitoring will have to deal closely with money laundering transactions through offshore companies the state defense order, then the responsibility does grow at times.
It should also be noted that among the so-called liberal economists, any control of banking by state institutions is perceived almost as direct pressure on banks and a blow to bank secrecy. However, the state defense order is the segment of state activity in which it is the last thing to rely on the opinions of liberal economists. Moreover, in this situation, the state acts as one of the parties to the transaction, and therefore has every right to control how they are going to dispose of its funds. And if someone is going to cover up the transfer of public finances “to the left” (offshore or elsewhere) with “bank secrecy,” then this is no longer material for discussion in the media, but for investigation by law enforcement agencies.
