The share of foreigners in Russia's public debt fell to a minimum in almost 10 years

As a result of Friday, February 25, the share of foreign investors in federal loan bonds decreased from 19.1 (as of February 1) to 17.4%, a representative of VTB Capital told RBC, citing data from the National Settlement Depository. The last time such a share of non-residents in OFZ was observed in December 2012, follows from the data of the Bank of Russia.

In monetary terms, the share of non-residents in OFZs decreased from 2.95 trillion to 2.7 trillion rubles, RBC's interlocutor specified.

On February 24, the government already announced the suspension of OFZ auctions for two weeks. According to the plan published by the Ministry of Finance, it was planned to raise at least 700 billion rubles from OFZs in the first quarter of 2022.

Compared to January, the outflow of residents from the Russian public debt accelerated: in January 2022, the share of foreign investors decreased by 0.8 p.p., as of February 25, by 1.7 p.p. In monetary terms, by 128 billion and 250 billion rubles respectively.

A more rapid decline in the share of non-residents in OFZ occurred against the backdrop of sanctions imposed by the United States . In response to Russia's recognition of the independence of the Donetsk and Luhansk People's Republics, Washington banned American financial institutions from making any transactions (both on the secondary and primary markets) with Russian ruble federal loan bonds (OFZ) or currency sovereign Eurobonds issued after March 1, 2022.