MOSCOW (Reuters) – U.S. sanctions imposed on Moscow this month have complicated foreign trade operations for Russian banks but they are gradually adapting to the new reality, the chief financial officer of Russia’s second-largest lender VTB said on Friday.
On June 12, the United States imposed Ukraine-related sanctions on the Moscow Exchange, halting trading in currency pairs with the dollar and the euro.
The sanctions package also targeted China-based companies that sell semiconductors to Moscow, and the US Treasury said it increases “the risk of secondary sanctions on foreign financial institutions that do business with the Russian war economy,” effectively threatening them with losing access to US financing. System.
VTB’s Shanghai branch, the only representative office of a Russian bank in China, fell under the sanctions.
VTB’s chief financial officer Dmitry Pyanov said on Friday that the bank’s China branch was “in a period of adaptation to new realities,” adding that the bank “will be fine.”
The entire Russian banking system – which faces complications when it comes to international cooperation in cross-border payments – has to adapt to new realities, Bayanov said.
A person familiar with the situation at Chinese banks operating in Russia told Reuters on June 13 that Russian branches of Chinese banks had stopped processing trade settlements between Russia and China in dollars and euros.