Olga Goncharova, Head of the Expert Center of the Association

[tanjimajuha20]

Participants of the XVII International Conference "Payment Industry - Strategic Development and New Solutions", organized by the Association of Russian Banks, named difficulties with cross-border payments and cyber fraud as the main problems facing the industry.

Chairman of the State Duma Committee on Financial Markets, Chairman of the Board of the Association of Russian Banks Anatoly Aksakov (pictured on the right) called the use of digital financial assets (DFA) one of the ways to circumvent sanctions restrictions, but its active use is hampered by the lack of regulation namibia whatsapp resource in Russia. He assured that this conflict will be eliminated in 2024. Also, as Anatoly Aksakov stated, the final introduction of the use of central bank digital currencies, which are already used in international settlements, into the legal field is planned for the fall. In addition, he called for more active use of other tools - in particular, the financial messaging system, launched by the Bank of Russia long before the 2022-2024 sanctions wave, to which more than 160 foreign partners have joined, and this number is growing. According to Anatoly Aksakov, the current situation also gives a chance to small banks that have not fallen under sanctions, and businesses are increasingly using them for cross-border settlements.

of Russian Banks for Digital Financial Assets and Digital Currencies, expressed doubts that digital financial assets and cryptocurrencies will become significant instruments for cross-border payments. According to her, stablecoin cryptocurrencies (traditional cryptocurrencies are not used for settlements due to exchange rate volatility) have three problem areas at once that are easy to overcome: crypto exchanges, tokens, and withdrawal into traditional currencies. As Olga Goncharova warned, all of them are controlled by American financial authorities and can be easily overcome. In her opinion, a way to bypass this could be to split payments, which complicates transactions for large amounts.

Digital currencies, according to Olga Goncharova, are much more promising, but the technology itself is still at the hypothesis testing level. But, according to the consensus assessment of representatives of 20 central banks, the real use of this instrument will not begin before 2030. Olga Goncharova cited the example of China, where the share of settlements using the digital yuan is only 0.13%, despite all the efforts of financial authorities.

The digital financial asset, as Olga Goncharova stated, is a convenient tool. However, even here, as she warned, there are sanction-vulnerable points of failure - emission centers and output into traditional currencies.

President of the Association of Russian Banks Anatoly Kozlachkov stated that Russian banks have generally developed an understanding of how to organize cross-border payments. According to him, the Russian Ministry of Foreign Affairs is actively helping in this. The overarching goal of these efforts, as Anatoly Kozlachkov noted, is to eliminate intersections with dollar settlements, during which participants must comply with the compliance established by US financial regulators. According to him, positive experience has already emerged with the use of non-bank settlement centers (NBSCs), and this method is the simplest, but not the only one.

Director of Government Relations at the Bitriver Group of Companies, member of the Industrial Mining Association Council Oleg Ogienko called for the use of all possible instruments in cross-border settlements, both traditional and using blockchain, including digital financial instruments and cryptocurrencies. According to his assessment, digital financial instruments can be used, despite all the difficulties, even now, and there are already many successful examples of this, and digital currencies of the BRICS countries can be used. According to Oleg Ogienko, the use of cryptocurrencies is hampered by the lack of full legislative registration, while the regulatory framework is at a high level of readiness.

Director of the Industrial Mining Association Sergey Bezdelov said at a press conference on April 11, which was held at the RIA Novosti site: "Russia is getting closer to regulating cryptocurrency. The Ministry of Finance recently announced that they expect the legislation to be adopted this year, and in the best case, even in the spring session."