* Revised budget approved, anti-crisis plan debated
* Putin warns against borrowings, printing roubles
* Oil price rally boosts rouble, stocks
* C.bank says rates cut possible in Q2
(Combines budget, jobless data, rouble, stocks)
By Toni Vorobyova
MOSCOW, March 19 (Reuters) - Russia's government cleared on Thursday a new budget for 2009, with plans to spend $47 billion to fight the crisis at the expense of an 8 percent deficit as fresh data showed jobless rates soared to a five-year high.
More than a million Russians have lost jobs since the start of December, including 300,000 people in February, and retail sales fell last month for the first time in a decade, during which Russia's consumer boom was fuelled by high oil prices.
"It is a unique budget. Russia is maintaining stability due to funds saved in previous years," Finance Minister Alexei Kurdrin told a news conference.
The fall in the oil price is the main factor forcing Russia into a painful budget revision and prompting it to devalue the currency by 35 percent since November to soothe the shock and help the economy as it faces its first recession in a decade.
A fresh oil price rally on Thursday gave a boost to stocks
<.MCX> and the rouble
Authorities also showed signs of confidence, with Prime Minister Vladimir Putin warning against external borrowings and printing too many roubles.
"To resort to the help of the printing press would not be sensible and simply dangerous," Putin told a government meeting.
"If we print more money than we produce goods, any solid economist will be able to tell you the result -- an increase in prices," he said.
Russian annual inflation is running at around 13 percent, which almost fully erased a 13.9 percent annual gain in average wages earned by Russians in February.
Government officials have said they expect companies to continue cutting the workforce with big layoffs expected in April, which could bring unemployment rates closer to highs of 9.2 million seen in the socially unstable 1990s.
Russia spent around a third of its reserves, or some $200 billion, over several months from last August on buying roubles to offset intense depreciation pressure.
It counts on the remaining $376.1 billion of reserves, still the world's third-largest, to sail through the next three years of budget deficits.
The new budget for 2009 foresees the price of oil at $41 per barrel instead of $95 previously, a 2.2 percent fall in GDP to 40.42 trillion roubles after a 5.6 percent rise in 2008 and a fall in industrial production of 7.4 percent. [ID:nLI364533]
Revenues are set to fall by 40 percent from the initial plan to 6.7 trillion roubles, while spending is set to rise by over 0.6 trillion roubles to 9.69 trillion, creating a deficit -- the first in a decade -- of almost 3 trillion roubles.
NO FOREIGN BORROWING
The government ordered a halt to all new construction plans [ID:nN16533612] to make room for 1.6 trillion roubles ($46.48 billion) in additional spending on anti-crisis measures, which would focus on social needs and the recapitalisation of banks.
"The impact of external shocks will be soothed by the project of anti-crisis measures," Economy Minister Elvira Nabiullina told another news conference.
The central bank has said it would cover the deficit by printing extra roubles without causing a further fall in reserves as the Finance Ministry will sell foreign currency from its deposits at the central bank to the regulator itself.
The central bank also said printing roubles would not create inflationary pressure as it would be compensated by a reduction in the liquidity offered to commercial banks. [ID:nLI202621]
High inflation has forced the regulator to keep rates high despite complaints from key industries, but it said on Thursday it could cut rates in the second quarter. [ID:nLJ579422]
It was not clear whether Putin's remarks about printing roubles were clashing with the central bank's previous statements. He added he believed Russia should limit borrowings.
"Our Finance Ministry thinks we can afford borrowing from internal markets. On external markets... we do not plan to borrow," Putin said. Kudrin said internal borrowing would exceed redemption by 410 billion roubles in 2009.
Nabiullina said the draft anti-crisis plan would still need final clearance before becoming part of the budget.
The draft sees Russia spending 555 billion roubles on subordinated loans to banks to lend to the real economy, 300 billion on state guarantees to top enterprises, 70 billion to help the car sector, 50 billion for the railway monopoly and 300 billion to compensate lower revenues of some Russian regions.
Kudrin said top Russian lender Sberbank