The Bank of Russia just picked its favorites. On Tuesday, the regulator shortlisted Bitcoin, Ether and Tether's USDT as the only crypto assets non-professional Russians will be allowed to trade once the country's new digital currency law takes effect. on September 1. The selection wasn't random as the central bank says it screened assets on market cap, daily trading volume, and whether an asset had at least five years of price history on foreign exchanges. Everything else is basically on the outside looking in, at least for now.
The headline number everyone's repeating is the ₽300,000 which is roughly $3,650 annual retail limit per intermediary. What's getting less attention is who's already getting ready for this. Alfa-Bank, one of Russia's largest private lenders, has been subtly testing live crypto trading through its Alfa-Investments brokerage app since July, using a small group of qualified investors who aren't subject to that same cap. And honestly, that's the bigger signal here. The serious liquidity probably won't come from retail users clicking through a risk quiz. It'll come from banks that spent the summer quietly building the infrastructure before Putin's August 4 law had even fully settled in.
There’s another part of the law that’s easy to miss. Crypto still can’t buy you a loaf of bread in Russia, the ban on using it for domestic payments is staying put. But cross-border trade is a different story. Exporters and importers can now settle contracts directly in Bitcoin, Ether, or USDT, with no cap, as long as they report the transactions and pay the required taxes. And the timing makes that even more interesting. The EU expanded sanctions on Russian-linked crypto platforms in its 21st package just last month. So this carve-out starts to look less like a consumer-friendly crypto reform and more like a potential sanctions workaround wrapped in investor-protection language.
Crypto Twitter picked up on the distinction pretty quickly. Coin Bureau pointed out that retail purchases are still capped, while “accredited investors” face no such limit basically, regulated access for the many, wide-open access for the few. Master of Crypto was even more direct, arguing that the approval is really about enabling international trade through exchanges vetted by the Central Bank, not turning Russia into a domestic crypto free-for-all.
The draft is open for public comments until August 24, while full licensing compliance isn't required until July 2027. In other words, banks that started building their crypto infrastructure early have a pretty long runway to get ahead.