The Bank of Russia, the country's central bank, has reportedly admitted that cross-border payments in crypto are inevitable in the current geopolitical conditions.
The Russian central bank has been rethinking the approach to
regulating crypto and agreed with the finance ministry to legalize crypto for
cross-border payments, the local news agency TASS reported on Monday.
Deputy finance minister Alexei Moiseev reportedly said that
the Bank of Russia and the finance ministry expect to legitimize cross-border
payments in crypto soon.
Moiseev outlined the importance of enabling local crypto
services in Russia, noting that many Russians rely on foreign platforms to open
a crypto wallet. "it is necessary to do this in Russia, involving entities
supervised by the central bank, which are obliged to comply with Anti-Money
Laundering and Know Your Customer requirements," the official stated.
Russian lawmakers have been historically opposed to the idea
of using cryptocurrencies as a payment method. In 2020, Russia adopted a major
crypto law, "On Digital Financial Assets," which officially prohibited
the use of cryptocurrencies like Bitcoin (BTC) for payment purposes. The Bank
of Russia has been skeptical about the idea of cryptocurrency payments because
it wanted to protect the Russian ruble as the only legal tender in the country.
The idea of crypto payments for national trades in Russia
surfaced in late 2021. Then, Russian President Vladimir Putin said it was "still
premature" to use crypto for trades of energy resources like oil and gas.
The situation has apparently changed amid Western economic
sanctions following Russia's invasion of Ukraine. In May, the Minister of
Industry and Trade declared that Russia wOuld legalize crypto payments "sooner
or later." Bank of Russia governor Elvira Nabiullina also later suggested
that crypto can be used for cross-border payments, but only if crypto doesn't
get into Russia's domestic financial system.
According to Moiseev, the central bank has reconsidered its
approach to regulating the industry, "given that the situation has changed."
He added that the planned infrastructure is "too rigid" for the use
of cryptocurrencies in cross-border settlements. "Which we certainly must legalize
somehow" he concluded.