Russia Plans Amendments to Regulate NFTs

The Ministry of Economic Development in Moscow has numerous amendments planned to regulate non-fungible tokens (NFTs), looking to amend the Civil Code and the law “On Digital Financial Assets.”

The news came from a meeting of a special working group held on the initiative of the ministry, Bitcoin.com reported Wednesday (July 27), and the discussions saw participants providing legal definitions for NFTs.

It was attended by representatives from the Central Bank of Russia (CBR) and Vkontakte, a Russian social media site, which announced that it wanted to support blockchains and NFTs on its platform.

The Bank of Russia has a more hardline stance on crypto, though. It said the Ministry of Economy shouldn’t be working with the issues about digital token regulations — instead, those issues should be dealt with under the Bank as well as the Finance Ministry. The regulator is against legalizing crypto circulation for payments.

Russian officials do want to expand the country’s regulations for crypto as well as tokens. Currently, that mainly consists of the “On Digital Financial Assets” law from January 2021, which introduced the terms “digital financial assets,” which partly encompasses cryptocurrencies.

PYMNTS wrote earlier this month that Russian President Vladimir Putin signed a law that bans digital payments. The law, approved July 8, bans the use of digital securities and tokens to pay for goods and services in Russia.

See also: Putin Bans Digital Payments in Russia

It comes as an expansion of a law that banned crypto from being used for payments. The bill was born out of Russian finance authorities’ sharp opposition to the digital assets, with the primary argument being that the country’s stability could be at stake.

The development came as many Russians were actively using crypto, transacting around $5 billion every year. There have been numerous crackdowns globally on crypto, with many governments wanting to put their own versions of digital currencies out instead.

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