印度拒絕俄羅斯要求以人民幣支付石油費用

Recently Yahoo News on-line reported the following:

India Pushes Back Against Russia Demands to Pay for Oil in Yuan

Anup Roy, Sudhi Ranjan Sen and Rakesh Sharma

Fri, October 20, 2023 at 9:45 a.m. GMT+8

(Bloomberg) -- India is rejecting pressure from Russian oil suppliers to pay for crude imports in the Chinese currency as tensions between New Delhi and Beijing continue to simmer.

Some Russian oil suppliers are demanding payment in yuan, according to a senior Indian official directly involved in the negotiations and another senior person at a state-owned oil refiner. The two people asked not to be identified as the discussions are private.

Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s government won’t agree to those requests, according to the two people and two other Indian government officials. Almost 70% of India’s refiners are government-owned, which means they would need to follow orders on payment instructions from the Ministry of Finance.

Indian Oil Corp., the biggest state refiner, had made a yuan payment for Russian crude in the past, although the government has since clamped down on that. Private refiners could also settle payment in yuan, although there are no official or industry figures to show the magnitude.

Russia has an excess supply of rupees, which it’s struggling to use, while at the same time its demand for yuan has grown sharply in the past year as the economy becomes more reliant on China for imports. Russian businesses have been settling more of their trade in yuan, with the Chinese currency this year replacing the dollar as the most traded currency in Russia.

Indian refiners mostly pay for Russian oil imports in dirhams — the currency of the United Arab Emirates — US dollars, and a small amount of rupees, if oil prices are above the $60 a barrel cap imposed by the US and its allies on Russian oil. While the yuan is sometimes used in smaller transactions, Russian oil suppliers are requesting that the Chinese currency be the main unit of transaction for oil trade, according to the senior Indian government official.

Delayed Payments

An executive from an Indian oil refiner, who asked not to be identified, said payment for about four to five cargoes had recently been delayed because the parties involved failed to agree on the currency of exchange.

Spokespeople at the Reserve Bank of India, Ministry of Finance and the Ministry of Petroleum and Natural Gas didn’t immediately respond to email requests for information. State-owned refiners Indian Oil, Bharat Petroleum Corp and Hindustan Petroleum Corp also didn’t respond. A spokesperson at Nayara Energy, whose single biggest shareholder is Russia’s Rosneft PJSC, declined to comment.

India’s resistance to transacting in yuan underscores its difficulty in balancing relations between Russia, an important economic ally, and China, a geopolitical rival. Russia is now the top crude supplier to India, making up almost half of the South Asian nation’s purchases.

At the same time, relations between India and China have remained strained as border disputes in the Himalayas continue to simmer and as the world’s two most populous nations vie for global influence, especially in the developing world.

Popularizing the yuan at the expense of the rupee also hurts India’s own efforts to internationalize its currency and would risk a backlash against Modi and his government as he seeks a third term in office in elections next year. India was the only nation in the BRICS bloc — comprising Brazil, Russia, India, China and South Africa — which opposed the introduction of a common currency, fearing it would eventually favor the yuan.

Russia’s Excess Rupees

Russia has accumulated billions of dollars worth of rupee assets given its wide trade surplus with India, but it’s struggling to use the funds. The rupee isn’t a fully convertible currency internationally, making it difficult to use in global trade.

Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov said in May the build-up of rupees is a “problem” and discussions were taking place on how the funds can be transferred into another currency.

Indian refiners want to use dirhams over yuan in order to comply with the government’s instructions, according to one of the people familiar with the matter. However, some suppliers of Russian oil are not in favor of using the UAE’s currency since it requires them to conduct the transactions out of Dubai, which would result in more scrutiny of the funds, the person said.

Translation

（彭博）—隨著新德里和北京之間的緊張局勢持續發酵，印度抗拒俄羅斯石油供應商要求以人民幣支付原油進口費用的壓力。

據直接參與談判的印度高級官員,和國有煉油廠的另一位高級人士透露，一些俄羅斯石油供應商要求以人民幣付款。 由於討論是私下進行，兩人要求匿名。

兩人和另外兩名印度政府官員表示，總理莫迪的政府不會同意這些要求。 印度近 70% 的煉油廠都是政府所有，這意味著它們需要遵守財政部的付款指示。

最大的國有煉油商印度石油公司過去曾以人民幣支付俄羅斯原油，但政府後來對此進行了限制。 私人煉油廠也可以用人民幣結算，但沒有官方或產業數據顯示其規模。

俄羅斯有過剩的盧比供應，正掙扎去使用它，同時隨著經濟對中國進口的依賴程度加大，其對人民幣的需求在過去一年急劇增長。 俄羅斯企業越來越多的貿易以人民幣結算，今年人民幣取代美元成為俄羅斯交易量最大的貨幣。

如果油價高於美國及其盟國對俄羅斯石油施加的每桶 60 美元的上限，印度煉油廠主要以迪拉姆（阿拉伯聯合酋長國的貨幣）、美元和少量盧比支付俄羅斯石油進口費用。 印度政府高級官員表示，雖然人民幣有時用於較小規模的交易，但俄羅斯石油供應商要求人民幣成為石油貿易的主要交易單位。

延遲付款

一位不願透露姓名的印度煉油商高層表示，由於相關各方未能就兌換貨幣達成一致，大約四到五批貨物的付款最近被推遲。

印度儲備銀行、財政部、以及石油和天然氣部的發言人沒有立即回覆索取資訊的電子郵件請求。 國營煉油商印度石油公司、巴拉特石油公司,和印度斯坦石油公司也沒有回應。 納亞拉能源公司的發言人拒絕置評，該公司的單一最大股東是俄羅斯石油公司 Rosneft PJSC。

印度抵制以人民幣交易, 凸顯了其平衡重要經濟盟友俄羅斯,和地緣政治對手中國之間關係的困難。 俄羅斯現在是印度最大的原油供應國，佔這個南亞國家採購量的近一半。

同時，中印由於喜馬拉雅山的邊界爭端持續發酵，以及作為世界上兩個人口最多的國家爭奪全球影響力，特別是在發展中國家的影響力，使印度和中國之間的關係仍然緊張。

以犧牲盧比為代價來普及人民幣也會損害印度自身貨幣國際化的努力，並可能在明年的選舉中尋求第三次連任的莫迪及其政府到時面臨強烈反對。 印度是金磚國家（由巴西、俄羅斯、印度、中國和南非組成）中唯一反對引入共同貨幣的國家，擔心最終這將有利於人民幣。

俄羅斯有過剩的盧比

鑑於與印度的巨額貿易順差，俄羅斯累積了價值數十億美元的盧比資產，但它在使用這些資金方面遇到了困難。 盧比不是一種在國際上完全可兌換的貨幣，因此很難在全球貿易中使用。

俄羅斯外交部長拉夫羅夫在五月表示，盧比的積累是一個 “問題” ，正在討論如何將資金轉換為另一種貨幣。

一位知情人士透露，印度煉油商希望使用迪拉姆代替人民幣，以遵守政府的指示。 然而，該人士表示，一些俄羅斯石油供應商不贊成使用阿聯酋貨幣，因為這需要他們在杜拜境外進行交易，這將導致這筆錢會受更嚴格的審查。

              So, India is rejecting pressure from Russian oil suppliers to pay for crude oil imports in Chinese currency. India’s resistance to transacting in yuan highlights the difficulty in balancing relations between Russia as an important economic ally, and China as a geopolitical rival.