INSUBCONTINENT EXCLUSIVE:
re-election.According to the Russian leader, while a turnover of $100 billion in bilateral trade between Moscow and Beijing was considered a
already made in rubles and yuan," Putin said, noting that this measure has helped boost Russia-China trade operations.Trade turnover between
the two countries has indeed significantly expanded since the start of Russia's 2022 invasion of Ukraine, which sparked sanctions that
in December 2023 introduced restrictions on foreign banks that conduct significant transactions or provide services that support Russia's
that year increased by 15-20% on average compared to 2021, as is evident from the countries' customs statistics
This trend intensified even more in 2023, with imports of these goods growing another 20-25% year-on-year.At the same time, the share of
This figure grew further in 2023, reaching about 65-70%
Media reports, citing sources in the U.S
presidential administration, said that Russia received about 90% of its microelectronics from China in 2023.Workers pack goods into boxes at
Chinese yuan and Russian rubles, which allows them to circumvent Western sanctions because the transactions are taking place outside of the
avoid Western sanctions until recently
opportunity.Signs of declineSince the beginning of 2024, the upward trend of imports has started to reverse
According to Chinese customs data, the country's exports to Russia fell for the first time since the start of the war in Ukraine, declining
by nearly 16% in March 2024 compared to the same period last year
The drop came after major Chinese banks started restricting payments from Russian banks.The situation with payments from Russia to China
deteriorated sharply at the end of March, with about 80% of transactions returned, an anonymous source in the Russian business community
difficulties are mainly with China's largest banks which are in plain sight of U.S
While small financial organizations are still working with Russia, they lack the capacity to process a substantial volume of transactions,
equipment was very difficult in April and is unlikely to improve in May, a source in the Russian business community told Izvestia.An
entrepreneur from Izhevsk, hometown of the Kalashnikov rifle manufacturer, who is purchasing equipment for machine tools in China, told the
Vedomosti business newspaper that initially, in December, a Chinese bank he was working with notified him it was ceasing payments for a
visible to Americans or Europeans, all of this is clearly reflected in the reporting that the bank's Western counterparts may demand," he
told the paper.Is there a solution?Currently, only the Shanghai branch of Russian state lender VTB is operating without failures, as it is
the only Russian bank with a financial license to conduct banking operations in China, it says on its website
Other Russian banks are still unable or unwilling to open branches in the country
This leaves businesses little options to conduct transactions.Ahead of Putin's state visit to Beijing, observers expected the issue of
financial transactions to be one of the key points of his agenda during talks with his Chinese counterpart
level of participants of economic activity
Solutions are possible, they are there
Of course, they should be supported at the state level in one way or another
I hope this will be the case," Putin said after the talks.Meanwhile, Kirill Dmitriev, the CEO of the Russian Direct Investment Fund (RDIF),
has proposed using the BRICS economic bloc, which Russia is chairing this year, as a solution to help boost Russian-Chinese cooperation.The
RDIF, as part of Moscow's chairmanship, will consider opportunities for creating a joint financial and investment infrastructure among the
BRICS countries, including both the system of mutual settlements and joint investment platforms, Dmitriev said at a news conference in
China.He did not specify when this initiative could become operational, and how exactly it would work with transactions in national
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