The Russian central bank supports the idea of legalizing the crypto mining business, but only if miners sell their coins to non-residents of Russia.
The Russian central bank continues to take a very unfavorable stance toward cryptocurrencies and has suggested that local miners be prohibited from selling coins to locals.
A draft bill that was unveiled in mid-November 2022 included support from the Bank of Russia for the idea of legalizing cryptocurrency mining in the country.
However, the Russian central bank wants to restrict cryptocurrency sales by miners to foreign exchanges and non-Russian citizens, according to a Dec. 7 report from the regional news outlet Interfax.
“We believe that cryptocurrency obtained as a result of mining can be sold exclusively using foreign infrastructure and only to non-residents,” the Bank of Russia’s press office reportedly said, adding: “In general, we adhere to the position on the inadmissibility of the circulation of digital currency on the territory of the Russian Federation.”
As many foreign cryptocurrency exchanges have prohibited Russians from utilizing their platforms in line with sanctions over Russia’s war in Ukraine, the new idea is likely to raise a lot of worries among Russian miners.
The Bank of Russia has long advocated for limiting resident trading to international trading platforms. The Bank of Russia has proposed that miners who wish to sell self-mined cryptocurrency within Russia do so through a “approved entity.”
The announcement follows the Russian Ministry of Finance’s rejection of the Bank of Russia’s plan to impose rigorous licensing requirements on cryptocurrency mining companies there.
On Dec. 6, Deputy Finance Minister Alexey Moiseev reportedly said that the Russian central bank has developed a new plan to only allow mining through “authorized organizations.”
According to the official, such a measure would essentially bring “total licensing” of crypto mining. “We are against it,” Moiseev reportedly stated. As previously reported, on November 17 the lower house of the Russian parliament received a draft bill on cryptocurrency mining.
A prohibition on the sale of cryptocurrency that has been mined to Russian citizens was not included in the bill’s original draft. The bill also prohibits miners from selling their coins elsewhere other than on international exchanges or through the state-backed platform that is being constructed as part of the cryptocurrency legal framework’s test phase.
The most recent announcement is yet another twist in the lengthy debate over cryptocurrency regulation between the crypto-unfriendly Ministry of Finance and the Russian central bank.
Arguments over the years have only made it so that Russian citizens and residents still don’t have a clear cryptocurrency framework, even if local cryptocurrency use is still rising.
Along with the government’s plan to legalize cryptocurrency for cross-border payments for imports, Russia’s law on crypto mining is one of the most eagerly awaited legal initiatives in the nation. The corresponding adjustments are anticipated to be approved by February 2023, according to Anatoly Aksakov, chairman of the lower house of parliament of Russia’s finance committee.
