Yet while an immediate cut-off has been avoided for now, the implications and response are still being digested by traders and governments across Europe, and expose the extent to which gas has become a powerful political tool for the Kremlin as Putin tries to fight back against sanctions. 

He has used that threat to a considerable degree this week, forcing Germany to implement the first stage of its emergency gas supply plan in the case of supply disruption – and keeping traders and politicians on edge from Frankfurt to London.

Germany’s triggering of its emergency gas supply plan raised the prospect of gas rationing in Europe’s largest economy and the severe consequences that would involve, with Deutsche Bank warning it could ultimately pose a “risk of structural damage to Germany as an industrial location.”

“Particularly in energy-intensive industries, the long-term propensity to invest would likely decline even more, because until now security of supply has been an asset in Germany,” they warned in a note this week. 

As the German government prepared for the worst, major European Gazprom customers such as Uniper and OMV were left studying Putin’s announcements, with Gazprom only starting to notify clients on Friday about the new payment arrangements. Austria’s OMV said it had initial contact from Gazprom but was waiting for written information on Friday, while Denmark’s Orsted said it had not yet been contacted. 

Under the decree, foreign buyers need to transfer foreign currency to a special account at Gazprombank, which will then buy roubles on behalf of the gas buyer to transfer to another account used to pay for the gas. 

The moves do not go as far as some had feared. “If it were a change to payment terms then there is a risk you would be reopening contracts and people would probably use it to extract something in return, which can create disruption,” says Trevor Sikorski, head of natural gas at Energy Aspects. “It feels like there is less chance of that now.”

Yet many also interpret the order as handing an advantage to Putin by strengthening Gazprombank’s role, helping to further protect Russia’s third-largest lender from widening sanctions against Russia’s financial sector. 

The EU gets as much as 40pc of its gas from Russia, and has so far exempted Gazprombank from sanctions due to its widespread key existing role in energy trades and risk of affecting gas supplies. 

The bank has become a key link to the outside world which Moscow is keen to maintain, having expanded its role in foreign gas export contracts after the Russian financial crisis of 1998. 

Analysts also caution that the new arrangements strengthen Russia’s position by exploiting other holes in the sanctions regime. 

“This is a political question, not commercial, and seems to be designed to return some of the discomfort from the restrictions imposed on the central bank to European companies, and to partially subvert those restrictions,” Ron Smith, senior oil and gas analyst at BCS in Moscow, told the Financial Times. 

Buyers now have a few weeks to work out how to respond to the new arrangements, as payments for gas delivered from April 1, when the decree comes into force, are not due until May. 

The situation remains volatile, however, and traders appear to be pricing in some risk to supplies after the payments are due in late May.

“The June price clearly gained [on Thursday] more than all the other forward months around it,” says Tom Marzec-Manser, head of gas analytics at ICIS. “So the risk is in June supply, if anything.

Kremlin spokesman Dmitriv Peskov continued to keep markets in suspense with a combination of threatening and conciliatory messages on Friday. He insisted gas supplies would not be cut off from April 1 and indicated Russia could at some point abandon the rouble order if conditions changed. 

Yet he also claimed Russia was witnessing “gangster actions” following reports in the German press about Germany possibly nationalising some Gazprom subsidiaries in Germany. 

It came as European governments and companies said they were working on a common approach to changes to gas payments, in an effort to continue to show a united front against the Kremlin. 

“Working closely with Member States and operators. EU coordination today to establish a common approach on currency payments for gas contracts with Russia,” tweeted European Commission energy division director general Ditte Juul Jorgensen.