Central Bank of Russia plans to allow banks to work with cryptocurrencies, will establish strict capital and reserve requirements for them - first deputy governor

SOCHI. Oct 9 (Interfax) - The Central Bank of Russia has decided to allow banks to work with cryptocurrencies, though the regulator will impose strict capital limits and reserve requirements on them, Central Bank First Deputy Governor Vladimir Chistyukhin said at the Finopolis conference.

"We are conservatives; we are considering whether, for example, taking crypto onto our balance sheets is a banking business. After discussing this with our professional banking community, we concluded that it probably makes sense to allow banks to operate in these areas," Chistyukhin said.

"At the same time, we plan to impose fairly strict requirements, capital limits, and reserve requirements to prevent this from becoming a de facto dominant activity," he said.

In March, the regulator announced it had submitted a proposal to the government to allow cryptocurrency transactions for the category of highly qualified investors. This new status is expected to be granted to individuals if their investments in securities and deposits exceed 100 million rubles or if their income over the past year has exceeded 50 million rubles. However, these criteria are not final and are still under discussion by the Finance Ministry and the Central Bank.

In May, the regulator published a letter announcing plans to establish separate requirements for calculating capital and mandatory ratios for banks regarding risks associated with changes in the value of cryptocurrencies. For now, it recommends that lending institutions invest conservatively in such instruments, for example, by setting a limit of no more than 1% of capital.