SWIFT ranks Russia third after Hong Kong and Britain in global use of China’s currency
Russia has become the third-largest market outside mainland China to use the yuan for global payments, according to data released by global financial messaging firm SWIFT.
Last month, it was reported that Russian companies and financial institutions were involved in nearly 4% of international yuan payments by value, compared to just 1.42% recorded in June.
Hong Kong remained the largest source of yuan transactions outside mainland China with 73.8% of the total, followed by the UK with 6.4%. Singapore and the US ranked fourth and fifth, with 3.77% and 2.98% of the international total, respectively.
Earlier this week, data tracked by the Moscow Stock Exchange showed that yuan-ruble trading has outperformed the dollar-ruble pair for the first time, while the yuan-ruble pair outperformed volumes in the euro-ruble pair at the end of the week of July.
Great interest in the yuan and other Asian currencies from the Russian financial and corporate sector has arisen in the wake of unprecedented sanctions introduced by Western states in response to Moscow’s military operation in Ukraine.