In a recent move, Russia’s Central bank plans to oppose private-ruble-based stable coins. Bank of Russia’s first deputy chairman, Sergei Shvetsov, is against the issuance of the same. According to a Russian media outlet, Prime, the senior executive released this statement. Hence the Russian crypto developers will not be able to issue digital currencies backed by the country’s fiat, the Russian ruble.
Russia seems to follow the Chinese footsteps in terms of approach towards fiat-backed stablecoins. Like China, Russia plans to regulate crypto in a way that it doesn’t have to let go of control. Therefore, it aims at suppressing anything that appears to be a payment mechanism in the virtual space. Sergei Shvetsov expressed this in a discussion that involved central bank executives and financial market participants.
” China has explicitly banned any stablecoins in the yuan. I think that we are not far from this”
“We procced from the assumption that the Russian Federation’s means of payment is the ruble”
Furthermore, he added that if a crypto-based smart contract or a project is in dire need of stablecoins, they must utilize the Central bank-backed digital ruble. Thus stating the uniqueness in the payment mechanism.
Recently, Russia announced the possibility of launching a digital ruble. However, they are in the process of deep research and study to issue the central bank digital currency. The government evaluates various aspects to issue the currency in a timely manner when the economy requires it the most.
Russia’s Bank plans to launch its own “Sbercoin” stablecoin.
One of the largest Russian banks, Sberbank, plans to launch its native stablecoin and a blockchain platform. The media outlet RBC stated that Sberbank was in speculations for a long time to launch its stablecoin. Sberbank houses more than 96,000 million clients. Hence, digital Sbercoin will lead to widespread adoption in the Russian crypto space.
However, Russia has been stringent in terms of crypto adoption. Back in September 2020, it planned to jail undeclared crypto wallet holders for 3 years. The Russian regulator also blacklisted Binance and various other websites in relation to non-disclosure of Bitcoin purchase-related data.
Follow BitcoinWorld for the latest updates.
