By Alexander Kolyandr
MOSCOW--Russian President Vladimir Putin on Thursday called for
the creation of a national payment system, a week after two major
international payment systems companies cut off a number of Russian
banks due to U.S. sanctions following Russia's annexation of
Crimea.
Citing the example of the national payment systems in Japan and
China, Mr. Putin said, "Why do we not do this? This definitely
should be done and we will do this."
Speaking to members of the upper house of parliament, he said
the Japanese system, which started as a national system, now
operates in 200 countries.
International payment systems companies Visa Inc. (V) and
MasterCard Inc. (MA) on Friday cut off Bank Rossiya, which had been
mentioned in the U.S. sanctions, and three more banks connected to
Rossiya or people on the sanctions list. Both Visa and MasterCard
restored services to two of the banks over the weekend, but are
still not servicing Rossiya and its subsidiary Sobinbank.
The holders of these banks' cards can't pay for goods and
services using their cards, but can use the cards to withdraw cash
from the banks' ATMs or ATMs of other Russian banks serviced by the
United Payment Service, also known as ORS, a national net that
unifies dozens of banks.
Mr. Putin said he regrets the payment systems companies'
decision. "This will simply lead to them losing certain segments of
the market, quite a profitable one," he said, adding that Russia
should introduce its own national payment system to protect its
interests.
Russian officials have for years discussed this idea, citing
possible threats to the national banking system, but this is the
first time the move has received support from the president.
Write to Alexander Kolyandr at alexander.kolyandr@wsj.com
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