This post first appeared on Russia Insider
On the 23rd of September, the Moscow Stock Exchange agreed to approve trade in Hong Kong dollars after a raft of Russian corporates had demanded the move. For Moscow Stock Exchange this was an important move as companies such as Sberbank and Gazprom had already made plans to raise billions of dollars in Asian currencies such as the Yuan, Hong Kong Dollar and the Singaporian Dollar.
The demand for Chinese currencies in Russia has spiked after the sanctions and the trade deals announced with China earlier this year. Yuan trading on the exchange is up ten-fold from last year and is growing at a rate of 26% month on month as of August. September is on track to post another record month with double-digit percentage gains on the month.
The move is the last piece of the puzzle in cementing Russia's new economic model; economic integration with Asia. It also signifies that the West may have lost Russia forever as the announcement also followed news that Russia's third largest bank, Gazprombank, had started issuing cards with China's UnionPay.
China is already Russia's largest trading partner making up 11% of all Russian trade and the two nations are targeting a minimum of 200 billion dollars of mutual trade by 2020 - half of which they wish to be settled in Rubles and Yuan.
This post first appeared on Russia Insider
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