Russia's central bank drafts first rules for ‘organized’ crypto trading

The Bank of Russia has published draft regulations outlining the country's first framework for what it called "organized trading" of digital assets and digital rights, including new requirements for crypto exchanges and digital depositories.

Under the proposals, exchanges would determine their trading procedures in their own rulebooks and calculate market and weighted average prices for digital assets and digital rights traded on their platforms.

The central bank also proposed creating digital depositories responsible for maintaining records of cryptocurrencies and digital rights. These entities would be required to hold between 50 million rubles ($640,860) and 250 million rubles ($3.2 million) in equity, depending on whether they operate on open distributed ledgers or provide post-trade settlement services.

According to the draft regulations, the required capital must consist of liquid assets, while any financial assets included must be of high credit quality. Similar capital requirements would apply to electronic platform operators, whose functions would be performed by information system operators settling digital financial asset transactions through nominal accounts.

The proposals also establish requirements for recording digital currencies and digital rights, maintaining digital accounts, and collecting information on account holders, system participants and recorded assets.

The Bank of Russia said digital depositories would operate under the same principles as traditional securities depositories and that it would maintain the official register of these entities.

The draft regulations have been published for regulatory impact assessment, the bank said.

The proposals follow Russia's crypto market bill passed by the State Duma last week, which introduced a legal framework for regulated retail crypto trading while maintaining the country's ban on using cryptocurrencies for domestic payments. The legislation is expected to take effect from September if enacted.