Russia’s largest bank struggling to get regulatory approval for its crypto services

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Sber, the state-owned largest bank of Russia, is facing problems and struggling to get regulatory approval to launch its Digital assets-based services to the Russian citizens.

In the Russian Federation, crypto is fully legal but citizens are only allowed to do crypto trading ( buy, sell and hold). Russian officials have strict rules and guidelines to prohibit the use of Crypto for payment purposes. In the last month, Russian officials proposed a bill to restrict the circulation and adoption of crypto in Russia. So overall we can say, Crypto is not more than an asset for Russians. 

Because of the increasing demand for crypto products, other financial sectors like Banks are facing a huge lack of funding with the existing traditional financial services. To sustain a better future, Banks are approaching crypto-related services to do a high-level business with integrated crypto and Banking services. But a big problem is regulatory approval and permission that is prohibiting almost all the banks to remain away from crypto services. 

Sber bank, Russian State Bank, is also planning to give digital assets-based services to Russian citizens. But the regulatory bodies are sceptical about the future of crypto with integrated banking services. That is why they are not doing their best to permit Sber to facilitate crypto-related services. 

On Tuesday, Herman Gref, CEO of Sberbank, said that they are expecting that they will be successful in registering with the Central Bank of Russia to offer digit assets-based services by the end of 2021. 

“We are in constant contact with the central bank, and we are discussing various issues. We want to believe that the platform will be registered by the end of this year”

In January 2021, Sber filed its application to get the approval of the blockchain Paltrow by the Bank of Russia, for its Sbercoin. So almost it took around 1 year but results from the officials of the BOR didn’t come. By targeting this issue, the Sber director said that it doesn’t take more than 45 days to get registered for the crypto-related services. 

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