According to Bloomberg, Russian citizens have cryptocurrencies worth more than 16.5 trillion rubles (about $215 billion). Bloomberg reported that this estimate was made by Moscow authorities. This figure was revealed as Russian government institutions attempt to establish a comprehensive policy for the future of decentralized digital assets.
After a call from President Vladimir Putin, regulators have been scrambling to get the country’s growing crypto-space in order. The directive was issued after the Bank of Russia suggested a blanket ban of crypto-related activities. This idea has been rejected by several officials as being counterproductive.
Russian media revealed recently that the government had drafted a roadmap in order to regulate and not prohibit crypto transactions. Bloomberg was informed by people familiar with the proposals that the most recent estimate was based on analysis of IP addresses and other information. Two sources chose not to reveal their identities as the policies are still being finalized.
According to the report, Russians own around 12% of global cryptocurrency holdings. This is according to Coinmarketcap data and equals a third to the market capitalization for their benchmark stock index. This could be one of the reasons the Russian government is more inclined than others to regulate the industry rather than imposing a broad ban.
This figure surpasses previous estimates by $215 billion. Anatoly Aksakov (head of the parliamentary Financial Market Committee) stated that Russian citizens had invested $5 trillion in crypto ($67 billion). According to the Bank of Russia, Russians make crypto transactions in excess of $5 billion each year.
The Russian Association of Cryptoeconomics, Artificial Intelligence and Blockchain ( Racial) and the Singapore-based TripleA payment gateway claim that more than 17,000,000 Russians have their own cryptocurrency, which amounts to over a tenth of Russia’s total population. Dmitry Chernyshenko’s representative, who signed the regulatory roadmap, said that the government also refers to this figure but declined to estimate the total crypto holdings for Russian residents.
