LONDON (Reuters) – The United States on Wednesday imposed sanctions on several Hong Kong companies, including VPower Finance Security, for their involvement in transporting gold produced by an already sanctioned Russian miner, the U.S. Treasury Department said.
In the new sanctions list, Washington sought to increase pressure on Moscow over its war against Ukraine and took aim at Russia’s access to support from third countries. The Treasury Department said foreign firms helping Russia’s war economy now “face greater risk of sanctions.”
Wednesday’s list included a multinational network “laundering gold for a designated Russian gold producer,” the organization said in a statement.
The designated manufacturer is Polyus, the statement said. In 2023, Washington imposed sanctions against Polyus, the largest gold mining company in Russia and the fourth largest in the world.
According to the statement, the Polyus employee and his Hong Kong partner were involved in a scheme “in which payments from the sale of Russian-origin gold were converted into fiat currency and cryptocurrencies through numerous shell companies in the UAE and Hong Kong.”
According to the Treasury, the scheme used Hong Kong-based Holden International Trading Limited and Taube Precious HK Limited to route payments, and UAE-based Red Coast Metals Trading DMCC to conceal payments from the sale of Russian-origin gold.
In addition, the Hong Kong-based company VPower Finance Security Hong Kong Limited participated in the scheme to transport gold of Russian origin, the company added.
Polyus declined to comment. VPower did not respond to Reuters’ request for comment. Holden, Taube and Red Beach could not be reached for comment.
Russia is the second largest gold producer in the world after China. According to consultancy Metals Focus, 321.8 tonnes were produced in 2023, or 8.8% of global mine production.
Moscow stopped disclosing detailed export and import data shortly after the 2022 attack on Ukraine, but some of its supplies are still visible through mirror data on countries buying Russian products.
Hong Kong was the largest importer of gold from Russia as of 2023, according to data provider Trade Data Monitor (TDM). The data does not track UAE gold imports from Russia.