MOSCOW (Reuters) – The Russian ruble fell further on Thursday, remaining at its lowest level against the U.S. dollar since October 2023.
At 0740 GMT, the ruble fell 0.4% to 97.40 against the dollar, London Stock Exchange data showed. On Wednesday, the ruble reached the 97 level for the first time since October last year.
The ruble fell 1.29% against the yuan to reach a one-year low of 13.65, according to London Stock Exchange data. In trading on the Moscow Stock Exchange (MOEX), the ruble fell by 0.18% to 13.71 per yuan.
“The ruble has again reached annual lows; the national currency fell in the fall by almost 15%,” analysts at brokerage BCS said.
Analysts pointed to several factors behind the ruble’s current weakness, including the October 12 expiration of a license from the US Treasury Department’s Office of Foreign Assets Control (OFAC) that allows commercial banks to transact with MOEX.
The license was issued to allow banks to end their operations with MOEX after Western sanctions were imposed on the exchange and its clearing agent, the National Clearing Centre, on June 12.
The sanctions halted all dollar and euro trade transactions on MOEX, making the Chinese yuan the most widely traded foreign currency in Russia. Trade in dollars and euros shifted to the over-the-counter (OTC) market, withholding price data.
There is concern in the market that Chinese banks providing yuan liquidity for exchange trading could withdraw for compliance reasons after their OFAC license expires.
Analysts and traders said other factors that pressured the ruble include falling oil prices during the August-September period, exporters withholding foreign exchange due to problems in international transactions, as well as the growth of cross-border settlements in rubles.
Analysts said that the country’s increase in foreign exchange sales in October supported the Russian currency, but this was not enough to offset the downward pressure.
One-day ruble-dollar futures, which are traded on the Moscow Stock Exchange and are a guide to over-the-counter market prices, settled at 96.54. The central bank’s official exchange rate, which it calculates using over-the-counter data, was set at 96.95 to the dollar.
London Stock Exchange data showed that the ruble fell 0.42 percent to 106.55 against the euro.
The global index of Russia’s main exports rose by 0.67%, reaching $77.07 per barrel.