Russia introduces crypto bill despite the opposition of Central Bank

Russia’s Ministry of Finance has introduced a bill in the parliament to regulate cryptocurrencies in the country, coindesk.com reported citing the press release published by the Ministry of Finance. The bill is based on the roadmap developed earlier in January 2022 by Russian law-enforcement agencies for regulating cryptocurrencies. However, Central bank of Russia seeks to ban crypto trading and mining altogether and has recommended fines for crypto trading up to $6,360 for individuals and upto $12530 for companies.

The bank instead supports the development of Russian CBDC. In the press release, Ministry of Finance emphasized that it would take into consideration the suggestions of the Central bank in the crypto bill, until it does not contradict the government's stance. Some of the important regulations drafted in the bill are the following :
* The bill would consider crypto as an investment tool and not a legal tender.
* Cryptocurrencies may not be used for paying for goods and services.
* The bill highlights specific conditions for cryptocurrency exchanges and over-the-counter desks to fulfill in order to be licensed and included in government record.
* The foreign crypto exchanges have to register legal entities in Russia for operating in the country.
* All cryptocurrency-to-fiat transactions have to be conducted through bank accounts, and the KYC rules have to be compiled by users in both banks and cryptocurrency exchanges.
* Besides, the exchanges would have to inform users about the risks related to crypto trading and investment.
* The investors in turn would have to qualify the test of being sufficiently aware about the general knowhow of cryptocurrencies and the risks associated with them.
- The ones who qualify the test would be eligible for investing up to $7464 yearly in crypto and the ones who don't qualify the test would be able to invest only upto $620.
* Cryptocurrency exchanges should maintain separate accounts for their own crypto funds and the funds of users and a record of the crypto addresses of all the users.
* Cryptocurrency mining will be supervised by the committed government bodies.

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