Russia one step closer to owning Venezuela’s oil reserves.

While the country’s isolation means the risk of contagion to international financial markets is limited, a default could trigger a global rush to seize assets owned by the Venezuelan government and its state oil company PDVSA, and plunge the struggling nation into a full-blown humanitarian emergency.

The only bright spot for Venezuela was Russia saying Caracas had agreed to its terms for restructuring the part of the debt it holds, with an accord to be signed within a week.

“Venezuela has confirmed the conditions that were agreed and so the process will move to a final phase,” minister Anton Siluanov told the Interfax news agency.

Venezuela’s official debt to Moscow stood at $2.8 billion as of 2016, with another $6 billion owed to oil giant Rosneft, which is closely allied with the Kremlin.

I assume Russia is betting on default because of this:

For a country with the world’s largest proven oil reserves — nearly 300 billion barrels, worth more than $15 trillion — such debt normally should be bearable.