Russian banks will be cautious in working with cryptocurrency due to AML/CFT risks - Duma working group head

UFA. Feb 10 (Interfax) - Russian banks seek to abide by the norms of "anti-money laundering" legislation (FZ-115), so they will be wary of participating in the creation of platforms for the purchase and exchange of cryptocurrency assets, and this factor should be considered when developing legislative initiatives in market regulation, head of the Duma working group on risk assessment of cryptocurrency circulation Elina Sidorenko said during an RBC round table on crypto-industry regulation on Thursday.

"We need to clearly define the banking or near-banking infrastructure that will do this. But we haven't even by and large thought about what that should look like. The banks are not going to take this on. No bank will now deal with a high-risk instrument in terms of money laundering," Sidorenko said.

"Any doubt that the bank conducted the wrong operation, and in the conditions of the shadow [market] - why a shadow market, because the lights have not been turned on, there is no regulation - everything will seem hazy, so banks will not risk their licenses. Neither Sber , nor VTB , nor Alfa Bank will today risk openly entering into cryptocurrency in any fashion except through some subsidiary, and this is a new story, a new issue that we must solve," she said.

The head of the working group also questioned the previously announced figures of Russian cryptocurrency holders.