The Bank of Russia is theoretically supporting the country’s decision to legalize cryptocurrency usage but only with the condition of banning local miners from selling cryptocurrencies to the local public. As per the latest bill proposed by the Russian Central bank, the cryptocurrencies generated through mining should only be exclusively traded to non-residents through foreign crypto exchange platforms.
But these new cryptocurrency mining terms are unacceptable to the Finance Ministry. Earlier on November 17, the bill passed by the legislator to the State Duma defined the mechanism of mined crypto trades by stating that crypto mining is a complex and resource-intensive process; thus, miners are rewarded with new coins by the system.
However, this new proposal demands miners to trade their self-mined cryptocurrencies within Russia through an “Authorized Organization”. This brings a lot of chaos among miners as many crypto foreign exchanges have already banned Russians from using their platforms under the compliance sanctions over the Russia and Ukraine war.
In this bill, the Ministry has not opposed the trade of self-mined cryptocurrencies. However, at the same time, the bill also does not allow miners to sell cryptocurrencies anywhere except on foreign exchange or state-backed experimental legal platforms. As per RCB, the circulation of cryptocurrencies on the Russian Federation’s territory is not acceptable.
Commenting on this latest mining proposal by the Russian Central Bank, the Deputy Finance Minister, Alexey Moiseev, stated that they are against this new scheme of trading mined cryptocurrencies through authorized organizations only as it will allow “complete licensing” of cryptocurrency.
This endless argument on crypto mining and regulation between the Russian Finance Ministry and Central bank is responsible for the “no clear understanding of crypto framework” among the local residents despite the growing crypto adoption.
Now, after this new bill proposal, the miners are left with two choices: either to trade their self-mined cryptocurrencies on foreign exchange platforms and avoid regulation laws or to use the established experimental legal platform of the country. In both scenarios, Cryptocurrency miners will be answerable to the Federal Tax Service.
The current bill on Crypto Mining is one of the most expected legal steps along with the legalization of cryptocurrencies by the government authorities in Russia.
While the miners are not in favor of the current proposal, the recent amendments are expected to be implemented in Jan 2023 as per the finance committee head of Russia’s lower house of parliament, Anatoly Aksakov.