Written: February 10, 1918
First Published: Sbornik dekretov i postanovlenii po narodnomu khoziaistvu. 25 oktiabria
1917 g.-25 oktiabria 1918 g., Moscow, 1918, p. 875.
Source: James Bunyan and H.H. Fisher, The Bolshevik revolution, 1917-1918: Documents and materials, Stanford University Press; London: H. Milford, Oxford University Press, 1934, pp. 602-603.
Translated: Emanuel Aronsberg
Transcription/Markup: Zdravko Saveski
Online Version: marxists.org 2017
1. All state loans made by the governments of the Russian landowners and bourgeoisie . . . . are hereby annulled (abolished) as from December 1917. The December coupons of these loans are not subject to payment.
2. Guaranties given by the said governments on loans made by different enterprises and institutions are likewise annulled.
3. All foreign loans without exception are unconditionally annulled.
4. Short term notes and State Treasury bonds retain their value. Interest on them will not be paid, but the bonds themselves are to circulate as legal tender.
5. Citizens of small means who hold certificates of not more than 10,000 rubles (nominal value) of annulled internal state loans are to receive in exchange certificates of the new loan of the Russian Socialist Federated Soviet Republic up to but not exceeding 10,000 rubles. There will be a special announcement of the terms of the loan.
6. Deposits made in the state savings banks and interest on them are not disturbed. All bonds of the annulled loans belonging to savings banks are transferred to the debit books of the Russian Federated Soviet Republic.
7. Co-operatives, municipalities, and other democratic and public service institutions which own bonds of the annulled loans will be indemnified in accordance with the rules to be determined by the Supreme Council of National Economy in co-operation with representatives of the above institutions, provided it can be proved that the bonds were acquired prior to the publication of the present decree.
Note: Local organs of the Supreme Council of National Economy shall determine whether the institutions presenting a claim are of a democratic or public service character.
8. The general liquidation of the state loans is in the hands of the Supreme Council of National Economy.
9. All detailed matters of liquidation are handled by the State Bank, which is to proceed at once to register all state bonds in the hands of different owners and other interest-bearing securities, irrespective of whether or not they are subject to annulment.
10. The local Soviets of Workers', Soldiers', and Peasants' Deputies, in agreement with the local councils of national economy, are to form commissions to determine what citizens fall within the category of [those having] small means.
The commissions have the right to annul completely unearned savings, even if the sum does not exceed 5,000 rubles.[1]
YA. SVERDLOV
Chairman of the All-Russian Central Executive Committee
Notes
[1] According to official data the general state indebtedness .... at the close of 1917 was sixty billion rubles. A considerable portion of that debt was in the form of short term treasury notes. . . . . Of the sixty billion rubles about onefourth were foreign loans, distributed as follows (in million rubles):
| England | ................................ 7,500 |
| France | ................................ 5,500 |
| Germany | ................................ 1,250 |
| Holland | .................................. 750 |
| U.S.A. | .................................. 500 |
| Japan | .................................. 200 |
| Switzerland | .................................. 200 |
| Italy | .................................. 100 |
| Total | ............................... 16,000 |
(From an article by Bronsky in Pravda, No. 28, February 17, 1918, p. 1.) Pasvolsky and Moulton place the foreign indebtedness at 13,823 millions of rubles and give the following figures as to the distribution of the debt by countries: pre-war government debt, France 80 per cent, Great Britain 14 per cent; industrial securities, France 32 per cent, Great Britain 25 per cent, Germany 16 per cent, Belgium 15 per cent, United States 6 per cent; war debt, Great Britain 70 per cent, France 19 per cent, United States 7 per cent. (Russian Debts and Russian Reconstruction, New York, 1924, pp. 20-22.)