According to its own statements, after Russia ordered the conversion of gas payments to rubles, Russia continues to deliver the raw material in large quantities for transit through Ukraine to Europe.

On Friday, 108.4 million cubic meters of gas would be pumped through the pipeline system, energy giant Gazprom spokesman Sergey Kupriyanov said, according to the Interfax agency.

That almost corresponds to the contractually possible maximum utilization per day, it said.

Despite Russia's war against Ukraine, gas transit through the neighboring country, which derives important transit fees from it, has continued at high volumes since February 24.

Experts hardly suspect any changes

A week ago, Kremlin boss Vladimir Putin announced that in future he would only sell Russian gas to western countries for rubles, which they reject.

On Thursday, he signed a decree obliging Western customers to open and make payments in a ruble account with a Russian bank.

The rule went into effect on Friday.

Experts do not suspect that the changes in gas bills will have major consequences.

"The bottom line is that not much should change for German companies," said Ulrich Leuchtmann, head of Commerzbank's foreign exchange department, on Thursday.

Gazprombank is currently not subject to any significant financial sanctions, but this is also intended so that payment for gas deliveries to the West is possible at all.

An advantage for Russia could be that a large commercial bank takes over foreign exchange management instead of the sanctioned central bank.

"This could ultimately benefit Russia's financial stability," explained Leuchtmann.

Commerzbank expert Tatha Ghose also said that when doing business with Russia, there is ultimately no way around the buyer countries paying at some point in the system with their own currency, since this is ultimately their national means of payment.

"How exactly the conversion into rubles is done could scratch the ruble demand, but nothing more."