Russia

Russian natural gas deliveries to Austria are continuing unrestricted and there is no indication that will change, its government said on Wednesday while adding it is scrambling to find alternative sources, Reuters reported. Austria obtains 80% of its natural gas from Russia, a heavy dependency that it says will take time to end now that Russia's invasion of Ukraine has made plain the need to shift away from Europe's cheapest source of gas. "Since the start of the war delivery volumes have not changed. In fact, they have increased," Austrian Chancellor Karl Nehammer told a news conference.

Germany is preparing for a change of control at the PCK refinery in Schwedt operated by Russian state-owned Rosneft (ROSN.MM) that accounts for all of Germany's remaining Russian oil imports, Economy Minister Robert Habeck said on Wednesday, Reuters reported. Germany has set out plans to become independent of Russian oil, which would make a European Union oil embargo manageable for Europe's biggest economy. It has reduced the proportion of oil it sources from Russia to 12% from 35%, leaving PCK the only remaining consumer of Russian oil in the country.

Hungary's OTP Bank, Central Europe's largest independent lender, is under pressure from the government of Ukraine, where the bank is also present, to sell its Russian unit, Chief Executive Sandor Csanyi said on Wednesday, Reuters reported. Earlier this month Csanyi said the bank would sell its Russian operation if there was a buyer, adding market presence there could become a moral issue. The Russian and Ukrainian units accounted for 15.8% of OTP's profit last year.

Russia will cut off the gas to Poland and Bulgaria on Wednesday in a major escalation in the standoff between Moscow and Europe over energy supplies and the war in Ukraine, Bloomberg News reported. Moscow is making good on a threat to halt gas supplies to countries that refuse President Vladimir Putin’s new demand to pay for the fuel in rubles. The European Union has rejected the demand in principle but now payment deadlines are starting to fall due, governments across Europe need to decide whether to accept Putin’s terms or lose crucial supplies -- and run the risk of energy rationing.

Poland is imposing sanctions on 50 Russian oligarchs and companies, the interior minister said on Tuesday, as it seeks to increase pressure on Moscow over its invasion of Ukraine, Reuters reported. Poland this month passed a law allowing it to freeze the assets of Russian entities and ban imports of coal from Russia, above and beyond sanctions imposed jointly by European Union countries.

Canada plans to give itself the power to seize the assets of sanctioned Russian individuals and companies and use them to compensate victims of the war in Ukraine, Bloomberg News reported. The new measures will be included in the government’s budget legislation, meaning they are almost certain to pass in parliament by summer. Foreign Minister Melanie Joly said the law will be the first of its kind in the Group of Seven. Canada has now sanctioned more than 1,100 Russian individuals and companies since President Vladimir Putin’s annexation of Crimea in 2014.

Air Lease Corp. said on Friday it would write off the value of the 27 jets it has remaining in sanctions-hit Russia, a move that is expected to lead to charges of about $802 million, Reuters reported. Global aircraft leasing companies have been scrambling to repossess more than 400 jets worth almost $10 billion from Russian airlines, which have mostly been unresponsive to demands for surrendering the jets. "It is unlikely that the company will regain possession of the aircraft that have not been returned and that remain in Russia," Air Lease said in a statement.

Russian households withdrew foreign currency worth $9.8 billion from their accounts in March and banks cut new corporate lending by around one third, the central bank said on Wednesday, as western sanctions over events in Ukraine spooked consumers, Reuters reported. "The quarter was difficult, to put it bluntly. It was very worrying at certain moments, but most importantly, the situation managed to stabilise," said Alexander Danilov, director of the central bank's banking regulation and analytics department. "The banking sector faced significant outflow of the population's funds ...

As Russia teeters on the brink of a historic default, foreign investors in the country's debt have few palatable options to recover their money: bet on costly legal action, trust bilateral agreements will stand, or sit on their hands, according to a Reuters analysis. Foreign creditors would typically try to band together to negotiate, go to court or in some cases seek arbitration in cases of default, but Western sanctions in the wake of Moscow's invasion of Ukraine and the peculiarities of Russian sovereign bonds make those options hard at the moment, lawyers said.

Russia’s payment of rubles on two dollar bonds was ruled a potential default by a derivatives panel, bringing holders of insurance contracts on the debt closer to a payout, Bloomberg News reported. The Credit Derivatives Determinations Committee said Wednesday that a “Potential Failure-to-Pay” event occurred for credit-default swaps when Russia paid rubles after foreign banks declined to process U.S. currency transfers. The group, which includes Goldman Sachs Group Inc., Barclays Plc and JPMorgan Chase & Co., said the potential failure happened on April 4.