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US Says it Has Not Asked India to Cut Russian Oil Purchases

FILE PHOTO: A man counts Indian currency notes inside a shop in Mumbai, India, August 13, 2018. REUTERS/Francis Mascarenhas/File Photo
FILE PHOTO: A man counts Indian currency notes inside a shop in Mumbai, India, August 13, 2018. REUTERS/Francis Mascarenhas/File Photo
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US Says it Has Not Asked India to Cut Russian Oil Purchases

FILE PHOTO: A man counts Indian currency notes inside a shop in Mumbai, India, August 13, 2018. REUTERS/Francis Mascarenhas/File Photo
FILE PHOTO: A man counts Indian currency notes inside a shop in Mumbai, India, August 13, 2018. REUTERS/Francis Mascarenhas/File Photo

The United States has not asked India to cut Russian oil imports as the goal of sanctions and the G7-imposed $60 per barrel price cap is to have stable global oil supplies while hitting Moscow's revenue, an American treasury official said on Thursday.
India has emerged as one of the top buyers of Russian sea-borne oil since Western nations imposed sanctions and halted purchases in response to Moscow's invasion of Ukraine in February 2022, Reuters reported.
"It is important to us to keep the oil supply on the market. But what we want to do is limit Putin's profit from it," Eric Van Nostrand, who is performing the duties of US Treasury assistant secretary for economic policy, said in New Delhi, referring to Russian President Vladimir Putin.
Van Nostrand said that buyers can purchase Russian oil at deeper discounts outside of the price cap mechanism, if they do not use Western services like insurance and broking, thus limiting Moscow's sales avenues.
"They (Russia) have to sell oil for less," he said.
The sanctions are intended to limit the options available to Russia to three: sell its oil under the price cap, offer deeper discounts to buyers if they circumvent Western services, or shut its oil wells, Van Nostrand added.
The price cap imposed by the Group of Seven (G7) wealthy nations, the European Union and Australia bans the use of Western maritime services such as insurance, flagging the transportation when tankers carry Russian oil priced at or above $60 a barrel.
Anna Morris, acting assistant secretary for terror financing at the US Treasury, said that G7 nations had the option to review the price cap depending on market conditions or other factors.
As part of its wide-ranging sanction mechanism against Russian oil trade, the United States in February imposed sanctions on Russian state-run shipper Sovcomflot (SCF) and 14 of its crude oil tankers involved in Russian oil transportation.
Morris said that SCF vessels that have been identified in the recent rounds of sanctions "certainly carry with them the sanctions risk ... the 14 vessels in particular that have been named are sanctioned vessels."
The US officials are in India this week meeting with government officials and business leaders to discuss cooperation on anti-money laundering, countering the financing of terrorism, and implementation of the price cap.
Asked about the sale to Western nations of refined products produced from Russian oil, Morris said that would not breach the sanctions.
"Once Russian oil is refined, from a technical perspective it is no longer Russian oil. If it is refined in a country and then sent forward, from a sanctions perspective that is an import from the country of purchase it is not an import from Russia."

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ECB's Lagarde Renews Integration Call as Trade War Looms

FILE PHOTO: European Central Bank President Christine Lagarde and Governor of the Bank of Finland Olli Rehn arrive at the non-monetary policy meeting of the ECB's Governing Council in Inari, Finnish Lapland, Finland February 22, 2023. Lehtikuva/Tarmo Lehtosalo via REUTERS//File Photo
FILE PHOTO: European Central Bank President Christine Lagarde and Governor of the Bank of Finland Olli Rehn arrive at the non-monetary policy meeting of the ECB's Governing Council in Inari, Finnish Lapland, Finland February 22, 2023. Lehtikuva/Tarmo Lehtosalo via REUTERS//File Photo
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ECB's Lagarde Renews Integration Call as Trade War Looms

FILE PHOTO: European Central Bank President Christine Lagarde and Governor of the Bank of Finland Olli Rehn arrive at the non-monetary policy meeting of the ECB's Governing Council in Inari, Finnish Lapland, Finland February 22, 2023. Lehtikuva/Tarmo Lehtosalo via REUTERS//File Photo
FILE PHOTO: European Central Bank President Christine Lagarde and Governor of the Bank of Finland Olli Rehn arrive at the non-monetary policy meeting of the ECB's Governing Council in Inari, Finnish Lapland, Finland February 22, 2023. Lehtikuva/Tarmo Lehtosalo via REUTERS//File Photo

European Central Bank President Christine Lagarde renewed her call for economic integration across Europe on Friday, arguing that intensifying global trade tensions and a growing technology gap with the United States create fresh urgency for action.
US President-elect Donald Trump has promised to impose tariffs on most if not all imports and said Europe would pay a heavy price for having run a large trade surplus with the US for decades.
"The geopolitical environment has also become less favorable, with growing threats to free trade from all corners of the world," Lagarde said in a speech, without directly referring to Trump.
"The urgency to integrate our capital markets has risen."
While Europe has made some progress, EU members tend to water down most proposals to protect vested national interests to the detriment of the bloc as a whole, Reuters quoted Lagarde as saying.
But this is taking hundreds of billions if not trillions of euros out of the economy as households are holding 11.5 trillion euros in cash and deposits, and much of this is not making its way to the firms that need the funding.
"If EU households were to align their deposit-to-financial assets ratio with that of US households, a stock of up to 8 trillion euros could be redirected into long-term, market-based investments – or a flow of around 350 billion euros annually," Lagarde said.
When the cash actually enters the capital market, it often stays within national borders or leaves for the US in hope of better returns, Lagarde added.
Europe therefore needs to reduce the cost of investing in capital markets and must make the regulatory regime easier for cash to flow to places where it is needed the most.
A solution might be to create an EU-wide regulatory regime on top of the 27 national rules and certain issuers could then opt into this framework.
"To bypass the cumbersome process of regulatory harmonization, we could envisage a 28th regime for issuers of securities," Lagarde said. "They would benefit from a unified corporate and securities law, facilitating cross-border placement, holding and settlement."
Still, that would not solve the problem that few innovative companies set up shop in Europe, partly due to the lack of funding. So Europe must make it easier for investment to flow into venture capital and for banks to fund startups, she said.