The Bank of Russia has kicked off the live trial of its digital ruble amid more reports by the country’s central bank to suppress Bitcoin (BTC) adoption. On Tuesday, the Russian central bank announced the successful completion of the first central bank digital currency (CBDC) transfers among citizens. However, the nation’s premier financial institution rejected the Finance Ministry’s proposal of digital currency regulation.
The Bank of Russia’s CBDC launch aligns with its plans to debut its first digital ruble transactions early this year. In addition, three banks out of 12 financial institutions in the digital ruble pilot group have already integrated the CBDC platform. In addition, the Bank of Russia further stated that two of these banks have completed a “full cycle of digital ruble transfers between clients using mobile banking applications.”
The first testing stage requires that users open wallets on the digital ruble platform through a mobile application. It also requires the conversion of non-cash fiat into CBDC and transacting using the government-issued digital currencies.
During the second stage, the Bank of Russia intends to test the digital ruble as payment for goods and services. In addition, the central bank also looks to test other potential implementations that have to do with smart contracts and interactions with the Federal Treasury.
Amid all these, the Bank of Russia officially opposed the Finance Ministry’s crypto-friendly regulation concept introduced on February 8th. Speaking on why the central bank will continue to resist crypto adoption in the country, Bank of Russia governor Elvira Nabiullina said:
“We will spare no effort to convince the government and go into more detail about our arguments because we see significant risks. I’m counting on common sense here.”
