The share of Chinese yuan renminbi (RMB) used in global payments rose to 2.2 percent in July, up from 1.86 percent during the same period last year, data from the Society for Worldwide Interbank Financial Telecommunication (SWIFT) showed on Thursday.

The RMB retains the position as the fifth most active currency for global payments by value, the SWIFT, a global financial messaging and cross-border payments platform, said in its monthly report.

The four currencies that rank ahead of the RMB are the U.S. dollar, the euro, the British pound and the Japanese yen, accounting for 41.19 percent, 35.49 percent, 6.45 percent and 2.82 percent of global payments, respectively.

Russia has notably become the third-largest offshore RMB payment market in July, ranking behind China's Hong Kong Special Administrative Region and the United Kingdom.

Russian companies and banks accounted for nearly 4 percent of the internationalRMB payments in July, up from 1.42 percent in the previous month, SWIFT data showed.

There were no records of Russian payments of theRMB in February, when the Russia-Ukraine conflict began. Western countries have imposed unprecedented sanctions against Russia since.

The U.S. dollar and the euro in Russia's foreign exchange reserves have been frozen in large quantities, which have boosted the popularity of other currencies on the Moscow currency market.

The trading volume of the RMB on the Moscow Exchange surpassed the U.S. dollar for the first time on Thursday, Russian state news agency Sputnik reported, citing data from the exchange.

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(Cover via CFP)