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RUSSIA'S ECONOMY

Head of Russia's major bank expects tightening of cryptocurrency market

According to the Finance Ministry, legislative ban of transactions with cryptocurrencies would lead to conditions for the use of such currency by grey business

© Alexandr Demyanchuk/TASS

MOSCOW, February 15. /TASS/. Head of VTB Andrey Kostin expects that the market for cryptocurrency in the coming years will be tightly regulated, he said in an interview with Rossiya 24 TV channel.

"In the next year or years, I think it will be necessary to introduce rather rigid regulation of this process, this market, which can significantly reduce the speculative effect," he said.

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"After the crisis, the whole world was only concerned with trying to regulate financial markets, and suddenly an absolutely independent currency appears, a financial market that is generally unregulated, where the rules for combating money laundering and the like do not work. This cannot continue for a long time," Kostin noted.

Earlier, the Russian Finance Ministry has published the draft law "On Digital Financial Assets" regulating its issue and turnover. The document, in particular, defines tokens, establishes the procedure for conducting ICO (Initial Coin Offering), and also determines the legal regime for cryptocurrencies and mining. The latter are the subject of disagreements between the Finance Ministry and the Central Bank. However, the authors of the draft law are confident that including cryptocurrencies in the legal regulation of digital assets will reduce the risks of law violation and increase transparency of the tax regime, which will lead to an increase in tax revenues to the Russian budget.

In general, according to the Finance Ministry, legislative ban of transactions with cryptocurrencies would lead to conditions for the use of such currency by grey business and legalization of revenues obtained by illegal means.

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