Russian is selling off US Treasury bills as a hedge against sanctions.

finance.yahoo.com

Russian officials are hoping Vladimir Putin’s rapport with Donald Trump will lead to rapprochement with the U.S. But they’re not taking any chances.

A U.S. Treasury report this week appears to show Russia liquidating dollar assets at a record pace, selling four-fifths of its cache of U.S. government debt, $81 billion worth, over a two-month period. It started in April, when the U.S. imposed the most onerous sanctions yet on allies of Putin.

The release caused a stir in the markets because neither the Treasury nor the Bank of Russia will comment on the transactions. And the data is murky, so it’s hard to know if Russia actually offloaded the bulk of its U.S. assets or simply transferred custodianship to a foreign entity to disguise ownership.