The currency crisis in the Transnistrian region is expanding. During two-three days, the exchange rate of the Transnistrian ruble against dollar leaped from 11.1 to 16 on the black market. Transnistrian economic expert Sergei Melnichenko in an interview for Radio Free Europe said the regional currency market got into a panic and illegal traders in currency appeared, IPN reports.

“On Tuesday, the official exchange rate set by the central bank wasn’t 11.1 rubles as it had been during the past year, but 11.3 rubles, which is the bank used the maximum margin planned by the supreme soviet for the whole year. So, the annual limit of depreciation was thus reached,” said the expert.

Sergei Melnichenko also said that the business entities practically stopped all the payments because they received merchandise, but cannot pay for it. “I consulted the director of a commercial bank, who said that everything is stagnant now. The bank performs no operations to sell or purchase foreign currency,” he stated.

The expert noted that the oscillations have an impact on the external trade and on internal consumption. “It is definite that the exchange rate of the Transnistrian ruble will no longer be the same. Its artificial maintaining during the past four years had to end sooner or later and it ends negatively,” said Sergei Melnichenko.

According to him, the exporters will now gain particular advantages. “Maybe this is the plan – to increase the amounts collected into the budget based on larger sums of Transnistrian rubles coming from the conversion of the currency obtained for the exported goods. The budget gaps will be easier filled this way. However, the importers and the population will be affected because it is unreal to control the inflation when the exchange rate soars by 30%,” said Sergei Melnichenko.

He noted that such a serious situation in the Transnistrian region hasn’t been witnessed since 1994, when the rate of inflation was 1,000%.