Amidst all the Western sanctions, the Central Bank of Russia on Thursday said it had given the financial service, Sberbank, a licence to issue and exchange digital financial assets.
As per reports, Both Sberbank, and the financial ecosystem Lighthouse have been granted the authority to trade and issue digital financial assets.
The license is seen as an ‘act of rowback’ as Russia had called for a total ban on crypto mining and trading in the country.
The bank stated that firms can use Sberbank’s platform to create their own digital assets and further accelerate market capital, buy digital assets through the lender’s system, or even carry out digital asset transactions.
Reiterating this, Sergey Popov, director of Sberbank’s transaction business section said, “We are only getting started with digital assets.”
Popov revealed that companies will now be able to conduct their first transaction on its blockchain platform in a month.
Ongoing Russia’s invasion of Ukraine has had its ripple effects on the crypto economy too, especially at a time when Russia is facing sanctions. Thus, this U-turn on digital assets is certainly no surprise. In a similar stance, cryptocurrency has been legalized in Ukraine as it continues to receive crypto donations from across the globe.