Finance Minister Alexei Moiseev announced that the Central Bank of Russia and the Ministry of Finance would soon legalize international crypto payments. He believes the approval of crypto services in Russia is necessary, as many Russians have to open crypto wallets on foreign platforms.
Nevertheless, he highlighted that this would not mean approving cryptocurrencies for payments within Russia.
Russian legislators previously resisted the idea of using cryptocurrencies as a payment method. In 2020, Russia introduced a crypto law to ban the use of cryptocurrencies such as Bitcoin (BTC) for payment purposes.
However, with the economic sanctions imposed by the West after Russia invaded Ukraine, the situation has changed markedly. In May, the Minister of Industry and Trade reported that Russia would legalize cryptocurrency payments sooner or later. Russia’s Central Bank also indicated that crypto could be for cross-border transactions unless cryptocurrencies would not penetrate the domestic financial system of Russia.
