The organization representing Russia’s crypto and blockchain sector has urged Vladimir Putin to spur regulatory efforts. The association fears the Russian Federation may lag behind other nations if it maintains its conservative approach toward new financial technologies.

Russian Crypto Businesses Want Putin to Engage With Regulatory Process

The Russian Association of crypto-economics, Artificial Intelligence, and Blockchain (Racib) has called on the President of Russia Vladimir Putin to support the crypto community in shaping the country’s regulatory framework for cryptocurrencies and related technologies.

In a letter to the Russian head of state, its members warn that the government’s attitude towards digital asset regulation poses “ serious threats of the economy lagging behind in the introduction of new financial technologies, ” crypto news outlets Bits. media and RBC Crypto reported.

The organization insists that the current state policy doesn't allow Russian companies to take advantage of the potential of new financial instruments and forces them to relocate to other jurisdictions which entails direct financial losses for the treasury.

This “ extremely conservative and prohibitive approach ” may cause Russia to lose pace in the development of the digital economy and deprives the country of the opportunity to come to a leader in the implementation of digital payment and accounting systems, according to Racib’s address.

Racib also reminds Putin about his meeting with IT associations in 2019 and the discussions about the new legislation. still, the promised experimental legal regimes for fintech aren't used in reality, while the proposed amendments to the country’s law “ On Digital Financial Assets ” make it difficult to implement digital technologies.

The letter,co-authored by the non-profit partnership of software developers, Russoft, asks the president to call a meeting devoted to these matters with the participation of the crypto space. They also suggest establishing a working group to prepare a pilot project for the preface of digital financial technologies, including cross-border payments relevant to Russia amid sanctions. 

(Lubomir Tassev, Bitcoin.com, 2023)