EUR/CNY printed 7.5029, down 0.37% on the day. EUR/USD held at 1.1194, essentially flat. Over the same window USD/CNY edged up 0.13% to 6.7036 and USD/JPY kept climbing to 158.17. The three legs diverge, and the settlement currency for transshipment needs a recount.

SNSUC runs crude transshipment across seven grades — ESPO, Urals and Lula among them — mostly quoted in dollars. But European refiners and traders take these cargoes more naturally in euros: with the euro soft against the yuan, the same barrel priced in euros converts into fewer yuan, so the European buyer's effective delivered cost drops. CIPS direct euro clearing routes that leg around the dollar correspondent, cutting one agency fee and one layer of sanctions-screening friction.

Operationally the dollar-leg risk is not the rate, it is the clearing channel. Shift the euro-eligible trades onto CIPS euro direct clearing to shrink the dollar exposure, then lock the JPY and KRW legs with NDFs. A cargo then settles as 'euro primary plus CIPS plus Asian-currency NDF hedge' instead of a single dollar line — lower channel and compliance cost.

This week watch whether EUR/USD holds 1.11. A break lower makes euro settlement cheaper and pushes the transshipment book toward euros; a hold keeps the status quo. Above 158, USD/JPY re-prices the NDF cost on the yen leg.