If Euroclear sheds its own slogan: “Safekeep your investments”, it’s going to be as if they are shooting themselves in the foot, to try to twist Russia’s arm.
But in reality, that’s how the West works, they think “Brinksmanship”, even know It failed miserably with Russia, and they try to hold “Pressure Cards”, to try to twist Russia’s arm to force it to accept any terms they come up with for an agreement to end the conflict. That’s what they think works.
Safekeep your investments, NOT!
But as they keep pushing in that direction, as it’s their habit, I bet they understand as well, that they are sacrificing the integrity of their own financial system, as they destroy the “trustworthiness” of such an integral part of the financial market infrastructure, which is protecting all countries’ assets, transactions and investments, equally.
Otherwise, if Euroclear, sheds its own slogan, which goes: “Safekeep your investments”, it’s actually going to be as if they are shooting themselves in the foot, to try to twist Russia’s arm, trying to end the conflict on terms that will save their faces, and give any type of credit to the failing “Project Ukraine”.
They are discussing this plan, while they know the legal repercussions that such an asset transfer move would trigger, and more importantly, the chain reaction of mistrust that would hit the integrity of one of the world’s most prominent central securities depositories.
It seems that someone doesn’t care what happens to Belgium-based Euroclear, doesn’t it? I wonder why? Well, I’ll come to this part later.
Selective International Law?!
When you read the freshly appointed Deputy Prime Minister and Minister of Foreign Affairs of Belgium, Maxime Prévot, of the “Les Engagés” party, condemning Israel for the “heavy human toll” caused by its inhumane strikes on Gaza, and his denouncement on X, of Israel’s blockade of humanitarian aid to Palestinians as a: “serious violation of international law”.
You begin to wonder, how can these politicians claim to respect international law, while they infringe upon it when they face pressure to penalize Russia, by breaking international law, as they seize its assets?
Not only that, Prévot also finds himself forced to accept such an illegal decision, of freezing and seizing Russian assets, and trying his best to find a path, where Belgium would not bear the burden alone when they do so.
Let’s “Pool the risk”, please!
In his interview with Brussels-based news website, “Euroactiv” on 9 May 2025, you can easily detect Prévot’s perplexity, as he fumbles through possible routes he’s trying to find, to keep the Russian assets frozen in Euroclear “legally”.
When asked what role exactly is Belgium willing to play to keep the assets frozen, his answer was: “It will not be possible for Belgium to act alone. We absolutely need to pool the risks. We absolutely need to have a mutual approach. Seeing the risk both legally and financially, it’s absolutely important to have a ‘coalition of the willing’ – this time related to the Russian assets”.
This revealing answer came after he pointed out two possible paths Belgium could take to reach that goal. As he said: “We could have a new international framework initiative, which will force those assets to stay in Euroclear, or another alternative would be a national initiative of the Belgian parliament”. Quickly following this up with: “We will identify whether it will be necessary or not to take this to our national law. I think it will be better to avoid this and really to offer an international framework with a strong legal basis”.
The man seems “arm-twisted” to go along with the UK-led European direction while trying as an elected official to keep his face in front of his Belgian electoral.
Alternatives and Newcomers
If you take a quick look at the list of Euroclear competitors and alternatives, you will find a catalogue of British, French, German, and American financial settlement processors, controlling most of the global financial ecosystem.
American companies such as OSTTRA, a joint venture between CME Group and S&P Global, sought after for acquisition by KKR & Co, an American “Global” private equity and investment company.
Or CLS Group, the financial firm headquartered both in New York, US and Lucerne, Switzerland, that proved a worthy global competitor to Euroclear, both during the 2008-2009 financial crisis and the COVID-19 Pandemic, due to their global settlement services, linked directly to the settlement systems of participating jurisdictions through accounts at each of their respective central banks.
Or maybe DTCC, an SEC-registered American clearing and settlement services company, which works through the framework of the Federal Reserve System, as a limited-purpose trust company. Compete with that, Euroclear!
And on the other side of the Atlantic, you will find British companies, like SSIs-compliant UK/Euro firm SSImple. Or the British firm Baton Systems, with its three headquarters in London, UK, San Francisco, CA, US and Chennai, India.
Some other jurisdictions that may prefer dealing with a French firm will easily find a willing alternative in Paris-based, BNP Paribas Securities Services. Others who might like to clear and settle their global financial dealings the German way will probably shift their assets to the Frankfurt-based Deutsche Börse Group.
I guess this is enough to answer my earlier question about why it seems that no one, except ostensibly Mr. Prévot, cares about what would happen to Euroclear? Now there is no wonder, is there?
That Prowling Renminbi
Another threat of competition might soon emerge in Asia, as Hong Kong looks to mitigate dependence on Western financial markets, by trying to push for creating a Chinese competitor to Europe’s clearing and settlement houses and securities depositories, to promote the Renminbi’s global presence.
A move reported in March 2025 by the Financial Times, whose authors mentioned Euroclear by name, as they wrote: “Hong Kong Exchanges and Clearing, which runs the stock market, said on Tuesday it was working with the territory’s monetary authority to develop an Asian international settlement house that could rival Belgium’s Euroclear and Clearstream of Luxembourg”.
Meanwhile, Russia begins to head to the expected legal path, with a lawsuit filed to a Russian Court by First Asset Management, previously a division of Sberbank, against Euroclear, to order the recovery of $185 million of Russian assets.
Now I think it’s logical to pose this question to Euroclear and to Belgium’s Prime Minister: What do you think you are gaining from this approach? And more importantly, which would most probably be on the mind of their stakeholders and voters on both the corporate and political levels respectively: Who are you actually serving?
I’ll leave the answers to the reader.
Tamer Mansour, Egyptian Independent Writer & Researcher
