The article discusses current approaches dominant in Russian economic literature to the question of the reasons of Russian economic stagnation, such as low quality of institution, exhaustion of favorable factors of economic growth, decrease of the aggregate demand in response to the current monetary, credit, taxation and budgetary politics. Results of polls conducted at the enterprises of the processing industry show that the shortage of demand is the major obstacle of the economic growth, whereas resource limitation, including financial ones, are seen as not particularly significant. Structural changes in the process of crediting of non-financial organizations, alongside with the preservation of high real interest rates is the principal reason of demand shortage. The authors show similarities between Russian stagnation and the Japanese recession of balances. Additional crediting in the national currency is used for substitution of hard currency credits. With the presence of the surplus of banking system liquidity and in the context of transition to surplus budget, demand shortage determines limitations for the investment growth.