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Russia's central bank, which sets monetary policy, regulates banks and financial markets, and oversees the digital ruble and crypto-asset rules.
Russia's central bank says its digital currency law bars transfers to non-custodial wallets and allows peer-to-peer crypto trades only until July 1, 2027. Licensed intermediaries, Sberbank among them, will handle everything after that.
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Bank of Russia told individuals on October 15, 2026 that they cannot move digital currency from regulated accounts into self-custody wallets. Sberbank won approval to run crypto exchange services the same day, so coins bought on licensed venues now stay in licensed custody.
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Sberbank, Russia's largest lender, won Bank of Russia approval to run crypto exchange services, with first products due Dec. 1. US Treasury sanctions rules cover crypto transactions with blocked Russian institutions as well as fiat transfers.
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Bank of Russia's first crypto registers give Sberbank and VTB three of the nine slots. Both banks plan to open crypto trading to their clients by December, though Sberbank's listing so far covers custody alone.
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Bank of Russia says more than 220,000 people opened digital ruble accounts in the first month, against roughly 60,000 it expected by year-end. With no data yet on balances or payments, the count says more about a cautious forecast and a mandated rollout than about demand.
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Russia's Finance Ministry paid some staff in digital rubles on Oct. 1, after 2025 budget trials worth nearly 16 million rubles. Payroll transfers are free on the central bank's platform through 2026, so the state carries the cost of moving its wages over.
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Bank of Russia draft rules would make banks list clients' crypto, sale income and mining proceeds on account statements from July 1, 2027. Officials file those statements with anti-corruption declarations, so their coins in licensed custody would reach the state on a bank's record.
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Sber says it will take USDT and Ether as loan collateral once the Bank of Russia permits public trading, which means the menu is set by the listing tests the central bank published on 11 August, not by the bank's appetite.
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Named telecoms and marketplaces begin taking the state's digital ruble on September 1, and a phased law makes acceptance compulsory by 2028, while paying with crypto stays illegal.
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Russia's two dominant marketplaces say they will accept digital rubles from September 1, with wallets opening inside existing bank apps. The mandate for large chains is dated a year later.
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MOEX says its first two perpetual futures, on bitcoin and ethereum indices, arrive in September, days after the digital currency law takes effect and with the approved asset list down to three.
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