WASHINGTON, October 11. /TASS/. Most American counterparts are ready to continue cooperation with the Russian VTB Group, the Group’s head Andrei Kostin told reporters on sidelines of the IMF and World Bank autumn session on Saturday.
“It is most important now to keep the system of correspondent relations, the settlement system, short-term money market transactions, swap operations in order to provide regular banking activities,” he said.
As the U.S. and the EU introduced sanctions against Russia, VTB could not attract long-term financing in those markets.
The Group has been negotiating ways to continue work which is not affected by the sanctions.
“I must say, here we receive positive responses from our Western counterparts,” the banker said. “Not from all. There are bankers, who prefer nowadays refraining from intensive contacts.”
Besides the direct damage from the sanctions, the banker mentioned the indirect damage related to banks overcautious policies.
“Western financial institutions after announcement of the sanctions have established a special control regime over any operations of Russian banks,” he said. Lately, he said, American and European financial institutions have paid huge fines for operations with countries, against which the U.S. and the EU had announced sanctions.
American banks only paid $200 billion in fines.
“Thus, overcautious polices do affect the situation today,” he said. “In the very beginning we experienced problems with payments, those were mostly delays.