Russia’s largest bank Sberbank is reportedly planning to scrap its crypto plans citing the anti Bitcoin sentiments of government regulators.
This news has come off as quite ironic since the bank’s CEO is a popularly known Bitcoin Bull. Despite the CEO’s Bitcoin enthusiasm, others at the bank are not convinced of the merits of digital currencies and are pro suspending all of the bank’s crypto related projects. The global markets head at Sberbank Andrey Shemetov; revealed that the bank was dropping all crypto related projects at a May 30 press conference according to a Tass report.
According to Shemetov;
“We waited for legislation that allows you to trade cryptocurrencies. Since the regulator is currently looking negatively [at bitcoin], we decided to suspend our cryptocurrency plans.”
This move did not surprise many considering that the country suspended its roll out of crypto related regulations last week. This move went contrary to Russian president’s Vladimir Putin’s February directive that ordered the government to make moves to adopt crypto currency regulations by July 1.
Those plans seem to have fallen off track after the Russian state Duma warned that Bitcoin had the potential of ruining governments. A Russian member of parliament holds that Bitcoin has the capacity of ruining governments because it has the capacity of facilitating the offshoring of massive amounts of money. Russia’s deputy chairman of the state Duma Nikolay Areyfyev warned that cryptos had the power to lead to Russia’s collapse by triggering a mass withdrawal of capital to offshore accounts.
According to Areyfyev;
“If cryptocurrency worked, we would be completely ruined today because all financial flows would be taken out of Russia. And Russia would end. Because cryptocurrencies were created to ensure that the state does not control the flow of capital.”
The legislator went further to claim that the purpose of Bitcoin was to aid tax evasion. According to him, the coin was created to hide large amounts of money attained fraudulently in off shore accounts. He therefore asserts that it is pointless to integrate Bitcoin with the country’s current financial system since according to him Bitcoin is too shady and speculative. His proposal is therefore quite similar to American democrat congressman Brad Sherman who proposed a blanket ban on all cryptocurrencies.
“I look for colleagues to join with me in introducing a bill to outlaw cryptocurrency purchases by Americans, so that we nip this in the bud.”
“An awful lot of our international power comes from the fact that the U.S. dollar is the standard unit of international finance and transactions. It is the announced purpose of the supporters of cryptocurrency to take that power away from us.”
As far Russia’s crypto future is concerned, a Duma official remarked that the country was not set to implement crypto regulations for at least another 30 years. The remark was made by Russia’s Chairwoman of an interdepartmental working group of the state duma for managing risks of crypto turnover.
This has poured cold water on any expectations of a Russian embrace of cryptos that had been anticipated by many in the crypto sphere.
Image Courtesy of Pexels
