the branch in Beirut closed and moved to Cyprus and became the Russian Commercial Bank RCB Bank. In September 1964, The Guardian named Andrey Dubonosov the one of the most popular men in the City of London. In 1965, the bank declared the possibility of exchanging transferable rubles for gold and freely convertible currencies. On 7 November 1966, Dubonosov had a heart attack and in April 1967, Nikolai Vasilievich Nikitkin replaced Dubonosov as chairman of the board, but he was nominal and Dix, who ran operations, controlled the bank. On 22 November 1971, the branch in Singapore opened. From the end of 1971 till the end of 1973 the bank’s assets have grown from £391.8 to £835.9 million. In 1972, MNB worked with Americans to obtain a very large grain purchase. In 1973 they began investing in the London Stock Exchange through City stockbroker Fiske & Co, today Fiske PLC. In 1975, the Moscow representative office started its operations. By 1977, the bank has been among 300 top banks in the world with assets of over $1 billion. In 1980s, the bank placed a strong focus on foreign exchange dealings, and in particular on attracting funds from Western Europe's banks to sustain its credit resources. The borrowings enabled it to support existing operations and provide the Vneshtorgbank with new loans as required. In the early 1980s this work was severely disrupted by escalating political and economic tensions. The anti-Soviet campaign that unfolded in the USA, Britain and other Western countries, combined with difficulties experienced by some socialist countries in keeping up their external payments, led to a situation whereby many Western banks refused to enter into credit, deposit and in some cases even foreign exchange arrangements with Soviet banks, including Moscow Narodny. Faced with these circumstances, MNB London practically stopped granting any new credits for operations not connected with Soviet foreign trade, and gradually reduced the bank’s loan portfolio as existing loans were repaid. No new medium-term loans were granted, either, with activities limited to short-term trade finance operations. Over the period from 1 July 1981 to 1 May 1982, the amount of credits with terms of 1 year or above on MNB’s balance sheet shrank from 794.4 million to 713.2 million rubles. At the same time, work on maintaining the bank’s supply of credit resources was stepped up. In 1985 it was decided to close the Beirut branch. In