Citing Bloomberg analysts, Izvestia reports that the US dollar is no longer the most traded foreign currency in Russia. In February 2023, the Chinese yuan for the first time outstripped the dollar in terms of monthly trading volume on the Moscow Exchange (MOEX), as a direct consequence of the anti-Russian sanctions.
It is likely that the Chinese currency will also overtake the combined total trading volumes of the dollar and the euro before year’s end, Artyom Tuzov, executive director of the capital markets department at Iva Partners, told Izvestia. “The more Russian banks are sanctioned by the European Union and the United States, the more transactions will involve the yuan instead of the dollar and the euro. That said, an increase in the yuan’s role in the Russian economy became inevitable the minute the dollar and euro accounts of a number of big Russian banks were blocked in February 2022,” the expert explained.
