LONDON, March 17 (Reuters) – Some creditors have received payment, in dollars, of Russian bond coupons that matured this week, two market sources said on Thursday, meaning Russia may have avoided this for now. which would have been its first external bond default. In a century.

Russia’s Finance Ministry said earlier it had sent funds to cover $117 million in coupon payments on two dollar-denominated sovereign bonds.

The payments, due March 16 but with a 30-day grace period, are seen as the first test of whether Moscow will honor its international debt obligations after Western sanctions hampered its financial transactions.

“The coupon was paid, against my expectations, and in dollars,” one person said. Another person said the money was received by a customer who was a bondholder.

Some other creditors said they had yet to receive their funds but were optimistic they were on the way, noting they had received payments on hard currency bonds from a range of companies public and private Russians in recent days.

Earlier, another source told Reuters that JPMorgan, Russia’s correspondent bank, processed the money sent by the government and credited it to the paying agent, Citi. It would be checked and then distributed to various bondholders, the source said. Read more

Citi declined to comment.

External sovereign bond payments were the first to fall due since sanctions imposed following Russia’s invasion of Ukraine and Moscow’s tit-for-tat measures, and bondholders feared that the transaction is frustrated. Read more

Russia had planned to send the equivalent amount of the interest payment in rubles if the dollar payments did not reach foreign bondholders, which credit rating agency Fitch said would constitute a sovereign default s was not corrected within a 30-day grace period. Read more

Washington imposed severe sanctions on the Russian central bank in late February, preventing Americans from engaging in any transactions involving it.

In early March, however, the U.S. Office of Foreign Assets Control (OFAC) issued a blanket trading license for U.S. persons for “the receipt of interest, dividends, or payments when due in connection with debt or equity” issued by the Russian Ministry of Finance. , central bank or fortune fund – an exemption that expires on May 25.

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The March 16 coupons are the first of several, with another $615 million maturing during the rest of the month. The first principal payment is due on April 4 when a $2 billion bond matures.

After that May 25 deadline and through the end of the year, Russia is expected to pay nearly $2 billion more on its external sovereign obligations.

The bonds themselves were issued with a mixture of terms and deeds. Bonds sold after Russia was sanctioned for its 2014 annexation of Crimea contain a provision for payments in alternative currencies. For bonds listed after 2018, the ruble is listed as an alternative currency option.

Russian bonds are hovering at deeply distressed levels in highly illiquid trading, with most issues trading less than a handful of times per day, according to Refinitiv data.

The premium demanded by investors to hold Russian hard-currency bonds over US Treasuries, as calculated by the JPMorgan EMBI Global Diversified Index, nonetheless tightened to 3,737 basis points on Thursday – the lowest level lowest since early March.

This premium had been just over 200 basis points until mid-February, when a Russian default seemed unthinkable. (.JPMEGDRUSR)

Russian companies are also being watched for their ability and willingness to pay. They have nearly $100 billion of hard currency bonds outstanding, of which about a fifth are held by international investors.

The country’s second-largest state lender, VTB (VTBR.MM), also the target of Western sanctions, said on Thursday it would hand over management of foreign securities to other Russian financial firms, the news agency reported. of State TASS.

Reuters reporting; Written by Karin Strohecker; Editing by Edmund Blair and Catherine Evans

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