Russia’s State Duma committee has cleared a revised cryptocurrency bill for a second, substantive reading — but with notable changes from earlier drafts that reshape how authorities would monitor and regulate digital assets.
Key takeaways
- The committee approved an updated, government-backed draft that drops a previous requirement for crypto holders to declare wallet addresses. Instead, users would report wallet balances and transaction volumes.
- The change, announced via State Duma Financial Market Committee Chairman Anatoly Aksakov’s Telegram channel, is intended to reduce the risk of exposing sensitive data that could be used against Russians.
- The revised bill would explicitly allow investors to buy traditional securities and Russian digital financial assets (DFAs) using cryptocurrencies. DFAs are tokenized financial instruments issued under domestic law and regulated separately from cryptocurrencies.
- Licensed Russian brokers and asset managers could be allowed to trade on foreign crypto exchanges and use overseas crypto services in future — but access would depend on additional conditions, including whether the foreign jurisdictions are deemed “friendly” by Russian authorities.
- Retail limits remain: non-qualified investors would still be capped at purchasing no more than 300,000 rubles per year of the most liquid cryptocurrencies through a single intermediary.
- A new control would let authorities freeze certain transfers for up to two days when large sums are sent abroad or relayed to third parties; the bill does not specify the threshold that would trigger such delays.
- It remains unclear whether lawmakers dropped or retained an earlier proposal that could have banned non-custodial wallets (where only the user controls private keys).
Background and next steps
- The draft first passed its initial reading in April. That version proposed putting the Bank of Russia in charge of licensing exchanges, brokers and other market participants, classifying cryptocurrency as property (giving assets legal protections in bankruptcy, divorce and similar matters), and continuing to prohibit cryptocurrency payments inside Russia except for approved cross-border trade.
- State Duma website records have not yet reflected the committee’s latest action. If the bill clears its remaining readings in the Duma and wins approval from the Federation Council and the president, it would form the backbone of Russia’s new crypto market framework alongside other national digital asset initiatives.
Timing
- The legislative movement comes as Russia prepares for the Bank of Russia’s planned digital ruble launch on Sept. 1. Major banks and large merchants are scheduled to begin supporting the central bank digital currency under a previously announced rollout plan.
Source: Statement shared on Anatoly Aksakov’s Telegram channel; State Duma committee review.
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