MOSCOW, November 28. /TASS/. The St. Petersburg Exchange determined the volume of funds in foreign currency that were not subject to restrictions and agreed with brokers on a mechanism for distributing these funds among trading participants, the press service of the St. Petersburg Exchange announced.

As for foreign currencies, clients of the settlement and clearing infrastructure of the St. Petersburg Exchange have access to funds in US dollars, Hong Kong dollars, yuan and tenge.

The volume of this currency is equivalent to 5.9 billion rubles ($66.2 mln) at the exchange rate of the Bank of Russia as of November 27, 2023 and amounts to 31.05% of the total amount of client funds, the press service reported.

"The St. Petersburg Exchange has distributed the above-mentioned funds in foreign currency among trading participants in proportion to the volume and type of foreign currencies that are in the clearing accounts of trading participants. After that each trading participant will independently determine the procedure for distributing received funds among its clients and the timing of clients’ access to them. Clients of trading participants will be able to withdraw these funds only in rubles, since the St. Petersburg Exchange is currently not available for settlements in foreign currencies," the statement says.

For the remaining part of foreign currency and foreign securities, foreign counterparties do not currently process orders from companies included in the settlement and clearing infrastructure of the Exchange for the making of transactions and the associated movement of funds and securities. In this regard, the St. Petersburg Exchange is not able to carry out settlements on these assets and, from November 28, will temporarily transfer them to non-trading sections.

The exchange noted that foreign counterparties continue to carry out compliance procedures in relation to the site.

"Prior to the completion of this process, they stopped settlement operations with it, including under the license of OFAC (Office of Foreign Assets Control, a division of the US Treasury - TASS). By December 4, international legal consultants of the exchange will submit their legal opinion on several scenarios of action for unlocking assets. After receiving the conclusion, the St. Petersburg Exchange will inform market participants about its further actions," the statement says.

As for some of the investors' positions on foreign securities transferred by trading participants through repo transactions, it was decided to close such counter positions through purchase and sale transactions.