# Selected Russian banks removed from SWIFT

Date: 2022

## The fact

On 1 March 2022 the Council adopted Regulation (EU) 2022/345 amending Regulation (EU) No 833/2014, giving effect to the political agreement of 26–27 February 2022 to disconnect designated Russian banks from SWIFT. The regulation prohibits specialised financial-messaging services used to exchange financial data (SWIFT) from being provided to the legal persons listed in the annex. SWIFT then implemented disconnection of the designated banks according to its own notices. This Fact is that selected-bank cut, not a disconnection of every Russian credit institution, not the 23–25 February first packages, and not a unique trade-volume coefficient. Reuters on 26–27 February recorded the G7/EU/US announcement that certain Russian banks would lose SWIFT access.

## Context

SWIFT is a Belgian cooperative messaging utility used by thousands of institutions. It is not a central bank and does not itself freeze assets. The Union’s instrument is a prohibition on providing the service to named banks; SWIFT then executes exclusion under that legal environment and its own rules. [Ursula von der Leyen](/people/energy-ursula-von-der-leyen) announced the political package with G7 partners. [Charles Michel](/people/charles-michel) chaired the European Council that had called for further measures after 24 February. [Vladimir Putin](/people/vladimir-putin) is the Russian counterpart, not an author of Regulation 2022/345.

The 24–25 February first packages deliberately left SWIFT off the table; Reuters quoted German and other officials preferring a later step. The 26 February announcement, 1 March regulation, and early-March SWIFT implementation are the enforcement-plumbing step. Banks not listed kept access.

Those would need SWIFT or customs series as separate Facts.

Keep this SWIFT cut off Council Decision (CFSP) 2022/327 of 25 February and off the December oil-price cap. Keep “selected banks” off “all Russian banks.”

The Council may prohibit specialised financial-messaging services under Article 215 TFEU. That office cannot operate SWIFT’s switches, enact an OFAC directive, or print a unique payment-volume coefficient not in the instrument.

## Evidence and sources

Official Journal of the European Union / EUR-Lex carries the official instrument or communique. Reuters records the same dated act independently.

## Significance

The attached driver is [sanctions-enforcement-effectiveness](/drivers/sanctions-enforcement-effectiveness). Disconnecting named banks from SWIFT is an enforcement-design hinge: it raises the cost of cross-border payment messaging for listed institutions without itself being a trade embargo. Whether evasion via other messaging systems later reduced that cost is a later, dated question.

## What is established and what is not

Established: Regulation (EU) 2022/345 of 1 March 2022 prohibits specialised financial-messaging services to listed Russian banks; Reuters independently reported the 26–27 February G7/EU/US SWIFT announcement; implementation in March 2022 is the recorded cut of selected banks.

Not established: That every Russian bank lost SWIFT, a unique trade or GDP coefficient, or that the 25 February packages already included the SWIFT prohibition.

What would change the picture: a contradictory original with a different date or name, a later repeal, a court that vacated the instrument, or a measured series that can be argued, with lag and alternatives, as a consequence of this instrument rather than of later institutions.

The date is the date of this instrument, not a licence to back-date every later harm or benefit.

SWIFT implemented exclusion of designated names. Russian authorities did not write the EU annex.. A later repeal, court stay, or successor order would be a different Fact with a different date. That pair identifies Selected Russian banks removed from SWIFT, not a later speech about Selected Russian banks removed from SWIFT.

Co-authors and later implementers named in Context remain on the file. Selected Russian banks removed from SWIFT on 2022-03 is not a licence to treat every later Official Journal of the European Union / EUR-Lex communique as this same act. If a later repeal, stay, or successor instrument exists, it needs its own date and its own row. This dossier refuses to average Selected Russian banks removed from SWIFT into a personality. The contribution described on this Person row is limited to The Council adopted the regulation. SWIFT implemented exclusion of designated names. Russian authorities did not write the EU annex. That limit is the alternative to treating office-holding as authorship of every later series.

## Drivers

- Sanctions-Enforcement Effectiveness: https://factrail.ai/drivers/sanctions-enforcement-effectiveness

## Sources

_Sources are listed on the canonical page._

## Methodology

https://factrail.ai/methodology

Canonical: https://factrail.ai/facts/swift-selected-russian-banks-cut-2022-03