So where did our oil money go?

Hi, it’s Navalny.

So, 2018 is here, and our Reserve Fund is now depleted.

It has become so small that the government has decided to shut it down from January 1

and merge what’s left of it with the National Wealth Fund.

Now would be a good time to ask ourselves: where exactly did all our oil money go?

First, let’s check if there was any at the first place.

If we look at this graph, we’ll see: there was, quite a lot.

You see this huge hump?

We can even give it a name: Mountain of Happiness.

Because it shows us that in mid-2000s, we were the lucky ones.

We’re an oil country, after all.

And when the oil prices skyrocketed, money started flowing to us out of nowhere.

We are the lucky ones.

We needed to do something with this money.

So our government looked at other countries and made a wise decision: let’s not spend this fast money on some nonsense.

Instead, let’s invest it into reserve funds, to make our country better and leave enough for our children and grandchildren.

Like in Norway. It’s an oil country too.

And the size of their fund has tripled over the last 10 years and now stands at over a trillion dollars.

That’s why the Norwegians are so rich.

Their average salary is 299,000 rubles.

And because of their wise control of the oil money, many more generations of Norwegians will prosper from this oil mountain of happiness from the mid-2000s

And it’s not just Norway.

Other countries, including not only oil exporters, but also China,

have formed sovereign investment funds with volumes of hundreds of millions of dollars

They make good use of the reserve funds and bring income.

And what did we get thanks to the wise Putin’s government?

From 2000, the first year of his presidency, the country’s budget

has received over $2 trillion of taxes and duties from oil extraction and export.

A part of this money was spent, and a part of it went to the reserve.

At a certain point, the total volume of all reserve funds was $225 billion.

Not as much as we could wish for, but still quite a lot.

Then, as you remember, the economic crisis happened, but after it the oil prices went up again,

and by 2014 the total reserves were at $177 billion

It’s a lot of money any way you slice it.

But within the three further years under the rule of our national leader the Reserve Fund kept shrinking until it ceased to exist.

Let me repeat it in layman’s terms.

There were two funds: the Reserve Fund and the National Wealth Fund.

And we’ve depleted and shut down one of them. The money’s gone.

What did we spend it on? This question is easy to answer.

The Reserve Fund was used to finance the budget deficit.

By the beginning of 2017, there were 972 billion rubles in the fund.

And within a year, it was wasted on some extremely important budget expenses.

Let’s take a look at the budget and try to add up the expenses to this amount:

State support of mass media – 77 billion

Upkeep of crooks and censors from Roskomnadzor – 8 billion

108 billion of subsidies to Vneshekonombank

It’s been financing corrupt and knowingly loss-making projects, like the Olympics.

The money, of course, was not repaid, and the losses were covered by our oil money

194 billion of subsidies to Crimea

68 billion of subsidies to RZhD.

Why, of course, RZhD needs these subsidies.

We’ve already told you how the former head of this corporation built mansions with fur coat storage rooms for himself.

They obviously need some more money

197 billion to the National Guard.

They’ll help you stop asking those questions about the Reserve Fund

And 300 billion is the damage to the budget done by the major supplier cartels

driving up the prices for state procurements, according to the government officials themselves

If it weren’t for these expenses, we’d still have a trillion rubles in the fund that we’d be able to spend on something useful.

Think to yourself now: are you happy with how your trillion was spent?

However! – the critics will say to us.

The government still has the other fund with our oil money – the National Wealth Fund.

If you go to the MoF website, you’ll learn that its purpose is no less than become a part

of a stable mechanism of pension coverage of citizens of Russian Federation for a long-term perspective.

It was recently announced that at the beginning of this year, this fund had 3.75 trillion rubles in it.

A part of this money is called liquid – it’s literally the money on government’s accounts.

The other part is part has been invested into the coolest, most profitable project Vladimir Putin could come up with.

For instance, $3 billion were given to Viktor Yanukovich to support him during the last days of his presidency in Ukraine.

Naturally, this money went up in smoke.

Vladimir Putin’s son-in-law, Kirill Shamalov, received a loan of $1.75 billion for Sibur, of which he is a shareholder.

Vladimir Putin’s friend, Gennady Timchenko, received 150 million rubles for his Novatek company.

It’s worth noting that Timchenko’s partner in this company is Leonid Michelson,

the one who donated 33 billion rubles to the Dar Foundation that built the Milovka residence for Dmitry Medvedev.

You must remember it from our film “Don’t call him «Dimon»”.

And this makes it perfectly clear why Novatek received our oil money.

And there’s more

RZhd again – 250 billion rubles

Rosatom and Rosavtodor with their completely non-transparent and corrupt schemes

The money invested into these projects may return, or, as previous experience suggests,

it may get embezzled to a varying degree.

But at the very least, what we definitely have remaining from our oil mountain of happiness is 2.3 trillion rubles of cash.

This is what’s left for this “long-term pension coverage” of us all.

If you take a calculator and count how much time it will take to spend all this money

if it’s used to pay the pensions to Russian citizens, you’ll get 3.5 months.

That’s all that’s left of our oil mountain of happiness.

Our country had this historic chance, but we’ve wasted it to make Putin’s son-in law, Putin’s friends and Putin himself very rich.

That’s why I nominated myself, to talk about this.

That’s why they didn’t admit me, that’s why I urge you to participate in the voter strike.

Do not come to the elections and to convince others not to come.

Because Putin simply needs you come and vote – it doesn’t matter for whom – and thus accept his re-election.

Accept his right to handle our national treasures like this.

I urge you all to take part in the protest in your city on January 28

- not for me or because of me, but to protect your own right to participate in our country’s life.

Your right to ask the government once every 6 years: what have you bastards done with my oil money?

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