UK added to the black list of Russian banks

On Friday, February 24, the UK expanded the black list of Russian credit institutions to include MTS Bank, Uralsib, St. Petersburg and Zenit banks. All of them were in the top 35 banks in terms of assets at the beginning of last year. The sanctions imply freezing the assets of banks in the UK. In addition, British individuals and entities must refrain from dealing with funds and assets, including providing funds to those on this list without the necessary license, the British government said in a statement.

In Great Britain believethat the inclusion of these banks in the sanctions list will further isolate Russia from the international financial system and will prevent circumvention of already imposed sanctions, follows from the official statement (.doc).

The motivation part of all banks states that they “are or have been involved in benefiting from or supporting the Russian government by operating in the financial services sector, a sector of strategic importance to the Russian government.”

Based on the latest available RAS reporting (at the beginning of February 2022, not disclosed in the future), it follows that the balances on accounts in non-resident banks (for all countries) of Uralsib amounted to 3.9 billion rubles, Bank Saint Petersburg – 3.1 billion rubles, Zenit Bank – 2.5 billion rubles, MTS Bank – 403 million rubles. But over the past year, their size and geography have undoubtedly changed.

MTS-Bank and Zenit and Uralsib banks stated that they have no assets in the UK, and transfers in pounds sterling are no longer carried out. The bank “Saint Petersburg” said that while studying the details of the imposed sanctions and their possible impact on the conduct of foreign currency payments.

According to the latest disclosed data (as of the end of 2021), the shareholders of Bank Saint Petersburg are under the significant influence of Alexander Savelyev (26.99% of the votes), he is also the chairman of the board of the bank. Uralsib is controlled by Lyudmila Kogan (81.8% of the shares), another 11.35% by Nikolai Tsvetkov. The controlling shareholder of MTS Bank is the telecom operator MTS (which is an asset of AFK Sistema). Tatneft owns 62.7% of the shares in Zenit Bank (about 36% of its voting shares are controlled by the government of the Republic of Tatarstan).

Earlier, the UK included Sberbank, VTB, Alfa-bank, Rosselkhozbank, Gazprombank, Promsvyazbank, Sovcombank, FC Otkritie Bank, Moscow Credit Bank, Moscow Industrial Bank, Ural Bank for Reconstruction and Development, SMP-Bank, IS-Bank, Genbank, RNKB, ChBRR, Rossiya Bank. The state corporation VEB.RF is also under British sanctions. Foggy Albion’s personal sanctions have been imposed against the head of the Bank of Russia, Elvira Nabiullina, as well as top managers of Sberbank, VTB, Sovcombank, GPB, Novikombank, and others.

Olga Sherunkova