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The Ministry of Finance has prepared its own concept for the regulation of cryptocurrencies in the Russian Federation, which involves conducting operations with digital assets through banks, full identification of users and tracking transactions. It is reported by RBC with reference to a document and a letter from the department to the Deputy Prime Minister Dmitry Chernyshenko.
The ministry is convinced that it is impossible to ban the circulation of crypto assets, as proposed by the Central Bank of the Russian Federation – this will only lead to an increase in the share of the shadow economy and an increase in fraud cases. According to the Ministry of Finance, there are about 2 trillion rubles in cryptocurrency wallets of Russian citizens.
The regulation of the industry will allow “minimizing the threat to the stability of the financial system and reducing the use of cryptocurrencies for illegal purposes”, as well as increasing budget revenues from taxes.
The letter also cites the position of the FSB, which sees an opportunity to create tools for obtaining user data from crypto exchanges and crypto exchangers, as well as legally track transactions. The development of regulation will also make it possible to prescribe the arrest and confiscation of digital assets on wallets.
According to the concept of the Ministry of Finance, it is planned to organize operations with cryptocurrencies to control them within the framework of the banking infrastructure.
To carry out transactions, individuals and legal entities will have to go through the identification procedure and open a wallet through a bank. Individuals are proposed to be divided into qualified and unqualified investors.
Banks that provide functionality for the cryptocurrency market must have universal licenses. They will monitor customer transactions for illegal activity, store transaction data for at least five years, and provide user data to regulators or law enforcement upon their request.
To control transactions and identify crime-related ones, the Ministry of Finance proposes using the Transparent Blockchain service.
For a sample procedure for the complete identification of customers, the ministry proposes to take the Swiss service Aximetria, which collects a large amount of data – full name, address, phone number, bank account, date of birth and others. The agency also wants to track information about the device from which transactions are made.
The document also proposes the creation of digital currency exchange operators that can work on the model of a P2P exchanger or exchange. They will have to register in the register of the Central Bank.
The Ministry of Finance does not exclude the work of foreign cryptocurrency exchanges in the Russian market. To do this, they will need to open a representative office in the Russian Federation and integrate with local banks.
At the same time, platforms registered in countries with a preferential tax regime or those that do not provide data on financial transactions will not be able to work in Russia.
Regulation is proposed to be distributed among the Central Bank, the Ministry of Finance, Rosfinmonitoring, the Federal Tax Service, the Ministry of Digital Development and the Prosecutor General’s Office.
In addition, the Ministry of Finance noted the need to determine the parameters for the implementation of cryptocurrency mining.
Recall that the department has developed its own concept of market regulation, said the head of the Financial Policy Department of the Ministry of Finance Ivan Chebeskov.
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