Reacquaintance with the irreplaceable ” minister

The paper considers the renewed interest in the life and work of Arseny Grigorevich Zverev, a long-time people’s commissioner, i.e. the USSR finance minister. The focus is on his secret report prepared for the Prime Minister I. V. Dzugashvili prior to the monetary reform of 1947, one of the most successful reforms in the whole monetary history. Having been published relatively recently in one of the newest historical journals, this report established Zverev as the true author of this reform. At the same time, it presents a brief review of the history of money and monetary systems in Russia, i.e. the USSR, including the monetary reform in the early 1920’s.