Bond pioneer who outsmarted Russian sanctions flops in China

Moscow

BEING first is never easy. Konstantin Vyshkovsky would know. As the head of the Russian Finance Ministry's debt department, he led the government's return to world markets in 2010 with the first bond offering since its default in 1998. Last year, with the country's biggest companies under sanctions, he outflanked western efforts to thwart a eurobond deal and pulled off Russia's first sale in three years.

Yet even Mr Vyshkovsky may be stymied after more than a year of efforts by Russia to become the first sovereign issuer to sell yuan debt to onshore investors. The goal by authorities in Moscow to hold the offering by using domestic infrastructure, and drafting it under Russian law, ran directly counter to China's key priority of limiting capital outflows, Mr Vyshkovsky said in an interview.