Companies in India are avoiding the US dollar and using Asian currencies to pay for Russian coal imports, according to customs documents and industry sources.
Companies are doing this in a bid to reduce the chance of being caught breaching Western sanctions against Moscow.
An Indian cement maker was reported to have negotiated a large deal for Russian coal with Chinese yuan, but the customs data shows that non-dollar settlements are becoming common.
India has aggressively stepped up purchases of Russian oil and coal since the war in Ukraine began, helping to cushion Moscow from the effects of sanctions and allowing New Delhi to secure raw materials at discounts compared to supplies from other countries.
Russia became India‘s third-largest coal supplier in July, with imports rising by over a fifth compared with June to a record 2.06 million tonnes.
In June, Indian buyers paid for at least 742,000 tonnes of Russian coal using currencies other than the US dollar, according to a summary of deals compiled by a trade source based in India using customs documents, equal to 44% of the 1.7 million of tonnes of Russian imports that month.