MOSCOW, May 16. /TASS/. Russian investors have managed to recover blocked assets worth around 3 trillion rubles ($37.5 bln), Central Bank of Russia Governor Elvira Naliullina said at a conference on Tuesday.
"Much has been done for our investors to restore their [property] rights; this includes the mandatory automatic pooling of depositary receipts, the mandatory transfer of accounts of rights to Russian infrastructure and replacement bonds. As a result, investors have recovered rights worth an amount close to 3 trillion rubles," she said.
Meanwhile, the issue of a centralized system for potential asset swaps is a political question, Nabiullina noted. "This is a matter of both sides giving their consent, and I see no such possibility in the near future," she added.
The regulator is currently considering various options and market proposals that would help investors to more quickly recover their property rights, the Central Bank governor pointed out. In particular, she acknowledged that a future exchange of blocked shares for securities frozen in the West may be in the cards.
Earlier, Nabiullina said that the regulator was only aware of individual cases of permits or refusals issued to private investors for unfreezing their assets, adding that the Central Bank was not thus far seeing any trend toward a general unblocking of assets. Meanwhile, the Central Bank of Russia estimates the volume of foreign securities owned by Russian residents that are blocked overseas at 5.7 trillion rubles ($81 bln), with over 20% held by Russian retail investors.