Russia’s third largest bank Gazprombank, affiliated with the natural gas giant Gazprom, will ramp up the commission fee for handling US dollars on its corporate accounts to 12%, according to Kommersant.
As followed by bne IntelliNews, Gazprombank is the only large unsanctioned Russian bank due to its role in the handling of the international trade settlements. In autumn 2023 amid the ruble weakening, Russia has reintroduced currency controls for exporters and is reportedly closely monitoring large-scale Fx deals on the domestic market.
The analysts surveyed by Kommersant see the US dollar settling commission as “prohibitive” and believe that the bank wants to drive its clients to transfer the toxic sanctioned currency into other banks, to convert it as soon as possible, or switch to non-dollar settlements.
For now, Gazprombank does not charge commission for the handling and storage of euros, and the commission for other currencies (Swiss francs, Swedish krona, Japanese yen) will remain at 1.5%. While other banks charge much smaller fees for US dollar accounts, opening new currency accounts has become virtually impossible, according to the survey of the market participants by Kommersant.
Despite Gazprombank not being sanctioned, at the beginning of 2023 US banks such as JP Morgan Chase Bank and Bank of New York Mellon stopped servicing GPB's dollar correspondent accounts.
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