Maxim Reshetnikov, the economic development minister, announced on Friday that Russian companies are "obliged to return" depositary receipts that allow the companies to trade on Western stock exchanges, in an apparent attempt to stabilize and strengthen its domestic stock market.
A depositary receipt is a tradable security certificate issued by a depositary bank representing shares in a foreign company traded on a local stock exchange.
The London Stock Exchange suspended the trading of depositary receipts of Russian companies in early March after the first raft of financial sanctions imposed by Western governments. The suspension caused the value of the notes for 27 Russian companies to drop sharply.
"Our Russian stocks, Russian issuers, unless the government decides otherwise, will be obliged to return here," Reshetnikov said in remarks quoted by Russia's Interfax news agency. "Now shareholders who own these receipts have the opportunity to apply and convert these receipts into shares that are already traded on our stock markets here at home."
Russia's central bank also said on Friday that it has suspended non-Russians living in those countries that sanction Moscow from making cross-border transactions to foreign accounts for a period of six months. The Central Bank of the Russian Federation also banned transfers from domestic brokers' accounts by individuals or legal entities from sanction-supporting countries for the same period.
The new rules restrict Russian residents from transferring sums worth over $10,000 per calendar month out of the country to foreign bank accounts. Transfers through services that do not require opening an account, such money transfer companies, were limited to $5,000.
The restrictions will last until Sept. 9, although Russian residents are still able to exchange foreign cash for rubles in any amount, the central bank said.
The modified restrictions come weeks after the country's central bank imposed new capital controls on foreign currencies after it blocked investors from outside the country from selling Russian securities. The Russian central bank also closed the Moscow stock exchange on Feb. 28 in an attempt to stop flood of money leaving the country.
Putin also approved a special executive order in early March calling for foreign debt to be repaid in rubles, even if the debt was issued in bonds in foreign currencies, in an apparent attempt to protect the Russian market's stability and creditor's interests.
Sanctions by Western governments restricted the central bank's access to approximately $630 billion in foreign currency reserves currently held abroad.
The Russian central bank's external debt-servicing data shows hard-currency debt payments to non-financial organizations will total $15 billion in the first quarter of this year then drop to $10.6 billion in the second, including principal and interest.
--Editing by Joe Millis.
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