How to transfer money from Russia to Canada and vice versa under sanctions?

How to transfer money from Russia to Canada and vice versa under sanctions?

Visa and Mastercard payment systems have stopped working with Russia. But there are other options.

Since the beginning of the invasion, Russia has been threatened with being disconnected from the SWIFT financial system. Seven banks will indeed be disconnected as of March 12: VTB, Russia, Otkrytie, Novikombank, Promsvyazbank, Sovcombank, and VEB.RF.

VTB, Otkritie, Sovcombank, Promsvyazbank, and Novikombank were the hardest hit. All of their dollar assets and accounts were blocked, and their clients will not be able to use the Apple Pay and Google Pay payment services.

According to VTB Bank, individuals are no longer allowed to transfer money abroad, but international transfers by corporate clients will not be affected by the sanctions. It is unknown whether Russian companies will continue to cooperate with Canadian companies when the rate of duties on exports from Russia rose to 35%, but it is possible to transfer money.

As we wrote before, using SWIFT can be compared to using one of the many messengers. It is convenient for transferring data between banks, but if some banks cannot use it, they will switch to other ways of transactions.

Since part of the Immigrant.Today team works from Russia, we made sure that it was possible to bypass sanctions. The transfer of money from a legal entity to an individual via SWIFT using account details in Tinkoff bank was successful.

The second, more convenient option — the Chinese payment system UnionPay, which is already working in Russia, as well as in 156 other countries, including Canada. But due to the huge demand for cards, banks have a shortage of plastic.

The UnionPay card in Russia will not be made instantly, at least within a week, and at the moment some banks, such as St. Petersburg, require 10,000 rubles for opening a card. It is announced that Alfa Bank, Sberbank, Raiffeisenbank and Tinkoff are thinking about launching it.

As soon as the largest banks start issuing co-baying (joint) cards with the two systems, Mir and UnionPay, and solve the logistics problems, it will be possible to easily transfer money between Canada and Russia. Russians will be able to make purchases in the world's online stores, pay for consultations with foreign specialists, and pay for online education.

So far there is no information about the abolition of visas, so it will also be possible to pay visa fees and tuition at Canadian universities without any problems. Unless, of course, Canada decides to block the Chinese payment system as well. Not so long ago Canadians considered China a bigger threat to Canada than Russia.

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  • #Russia and Canada
  • #Russia and Ukraine
  • #war between Russia and Ukraine
  • #war between Russia and Ukraine
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