Will credit holidays save Tatarstan’s businesses from the fatal consequences of overdue debts?
Experts: the new state support measure for SMEs may be paid for by all taxpayers
From October, a law comes into force in Russia under which small and medium-sized businesses, as well as the self-employed, will be able to take credit holidays for a period of six months. If an entrepreneur has several loans, a deferment can be arranged for each of them, but only once every five years. According to the Bank of Russia, overdue debt of SMEs in Tatarstan rose by more than 29% between January and August 2025, while for individual entrepreneurs it grew by 60%. How the level of indebtedness of Tatarstan’s businesses has changed in 2025, in which sectors it is hardest to repay debts, and how credit holidays may help — in a report by Realnoe Vremya.
Tatarstan business — leader in indebtedness in the Volga Federal District
Small and medium-sized businesses in Tatarstan in 2025 are actively increasing their debts, according to data from the Bank of Russia. If in January the volume of loans issued to SMEs amounted to 26.28 billion rubles, by July entrepreneurs had already borrowed 35.9 billion, and the total amount of money borrowed over seven months exceeded 237.66 billion. Tatarstan’s share of loans provided to SMEs from the beginning of the year to 1 August appears insignificant on a national scale — 3%, but within the Volga Federal District it is 21.3%. Businesses in Tatarstan took out 1.6 times more loans than those in Nizhny Novgorod, 1.7 times more than those in Bashkortostan, and 1.8 times more than those in Samara. Other regions of the Volga region ranked far behind.
Individual entrepreneurs in the republic borrowed 1.86 billion rubles in January and 2.92 billion rubles in July, amounting to 18.28 billion rubles over the first seven months of 2025. This figure represents 2.6% of the total loans taken by individual entrepreneurs in Russia between January and July 2025, and 14.8% of loans taken by entrepreneurs in the Volga Federal District. That is 1.3 times more than in Bashkortostan, 1.4 times more than in the Nizhny Novgorod region, and 1.6 times more than in the Samara region.
Overall, the trend of rising indebtedness in business is nationwide. Yet already by the end of the first half of 2025, in the total volume of loans issued to enterprises in Tatarstan, the lion’s share — 79.8% — consisted of loans to large businesses. Moreover, lending to large businesses increased by 64.9%, while lending to SMEs fell by 15.5%.
Overdue debt is rising
Statistics from the Bank of Russia indicate that business debt on loans in the republic is increasing, including overdue debt.
Debt on loans of SMEs amounted to 352.28 billion rubles as of 1 January 2025, and by 1 August had already reached 356.7 billion, an increase of 1.3%. At the same time, across Russia and in the Volga Federal District there was a downward trend in this indicator — by 6% and 1.6% respectively.
At the beginning of 2025, debt on loans of individual entrepreneurs in Tatarstan decreased from 29.67 billion rubles to 27.96 billion — by 6%, while in the Volga Federal District it fell by 4%, and across the country as a whole — by 4.2%.
The volume of overdue debt of small and medium-sized businesses in the republic grew over seven months of 2025 from 9.25 to 11.95 billion rubles — by 29.2%, compared with growth of 17.8% in the Volga Federal District and 13.6% nationwide.
Overdue debt of individual entrepreneurs in Tatarstan over seven months increased from 1.77 to 2.83 billion rubles — by 59.9%, while across the Volga Federal District and Russia as a whole growth amounted to 50.7% and 43.3% respectively.
According to the Bank of Russia, the largest volumes of overdue debt fell on trade enterprises, car service and repair stations, as well as construction companies and manufacturing industries.
Corporate lending began to grow in July
According to the Bank of Russia, in June 2025 the volume of corporate loans issued in Russia amounted to 6.9 trillion rubles, and in the Volga Federal District — 626.7 billion rubles. “In August 2025 credit activity increased in both the corporate and retail segments of the market,” the Bank of Russia noted in its information bulletin. “Monthly growth in claims on the economy amounted to 1.8% after 1.1% in July. The revival of lending was also reflected in the annual growth rate: by the end of August it reached 10.2%, ceasing to decline for the first time since mid-2024.”
The regulator stressed that corporate lending, which began to grow in July, made a significant contribution to the increase in claims. By the end of August, claims on non-financial and financial organisations rose by 2.1% (compared with 1.5% in July), mainly due to rouble-denominated loans issued for terms of more than one year. The foreign currency segment of the credit market also began to grow in August.
The volume of corporate loans in Russia as of 1 September 2025 reached 92.139 trillion rubles. Realnoe Vremya sent a request to the National Bank of Tatarstan regarding the volume of loans issued to large corporate businesses in the republic in July and August 2025, and on how strong the trend of growth in the corporate loan portfolio is in Tatarstan. The response will be published upon receipt.
“The bank will compensate losses from credit holidays at the expense of other debtors”
The possibility of granting credit holidays to businesses did not enthuse an expert from Realnoe Vremya, economist and head of the company R-Invest, Rustem Shaikhmetov.
In his view, the losses will be significant: one must understand what it means not to pay a loan for six months when the current interest rate exceeds 20%. Shaikhmetov believes that credit holidays are not beneficial for the economy — they fuel inflation and create increased risks for credit institutions, which will ultimately also need to be rescued.
The expert drew an analogy with putting out a fire in a house: against the backdrop of inflationary processes, such selective support looks as if one half of the house is being doused with water while the other is being doused with petrol. Shaikhmetov also recalled the situation at the beginning of the century, when the number of citizens benefiting from concessions exceeded the number of “non-beneficiaries” in the country — so there were more beneficiaries than non-beneficiaries, resulting in a deadlock. He noted that if this scenario repeats in the lending system, creditors will have grounds to demand compensation from the state as the initiator of concessions to debtors.
“As a result, we will all compensate for lost income and the credit holidays themselves — at the expense of our taxes. Let’s be honest: we will support business mainly at the expense of social programs, social budget items, which will have to be forcibly cut. After all, business is created to feed the state!”
In addition, the economist noted that recently various business benefits have become more of a rule than an exception, whereas the opposite situation would be more logical. This could lead to businesses that do not use benefits soon becoming a minority, further worsening their already difficult position.
Rustem Shaikhmetov also pointed out that the growth of overdue debt on loans for SMEs and individual entrepreneurs in Tatarstan is an alarming signal, likely caused by a lack of funds for businesses — a consequence of high interest rates, which in turn are driven by the high key rate of the Bank of Russia, double the rate of inflation. In his view, the economy is already showing the first signs of stagnation, in particular the halt in the growth of prices for durable goods and deflation, which increases risks for businesses.
“It all depends on the conditions”
Kazan entrepreneur and honoured economist of Russia and Tatarstan, Sergey Nikiforov, believes that the effectiveness of the new business support measure depends on the specific conditions under which credit holidays are provided.
In his view, if interest continues to accrue during the credit holidays and the principal accumulates without extending the repayment date, there is a high likelihood that the borrower will face financial problems.
“Well, if we abstract from all that,” he says, “if all these issues are carefully considered, then, in principle, this measure could be somewhat useful, because the Bank of Russia’s rate — and consequently loan rates — have already reached an extreme level.”
Nikiforov noted that, according to data cited in the Russian media, about a third of enterprises in Russia are currently unprofitable, and he considers high loan rates one of the main reasons. If they are given some respite, he reasons, it could allow many to recover.
As for the overdue debts of Tatarstan enterprises, Sergey Nikiforov believes that, combined with the high credit burden and the discussed or already enacted changes in tax legislation, they could prove fatal for some Tatarstan businesses.
The Bank of Russia has outlined the conditions for obtaining credit holidays. Payment deferrals will be allowed, including for enterprises that received loans under preferential lending programs. A deferral can be used for a single loan agreement no more than once every five years, but the number of such agreements is not limited.