The Bank of Russia has proposed limiting cryptocurrency purchases by non-qualified investors to a limit of 300,000 rubles per year through each intermediary: broker, crypto exchange, or manager. The regulator put this up for public discussion on August 11.
The rules for purchases and other crypto operations are set to come into force next month: the law "On Digital Currencies and Digital Assets" will start applying from September 1. It permits investment in cryptocurrency, including by non-qualified investors, but envisions restrictions for them, which the Central Bank will establish after discussing the conditions it proposed.
Experts commented for "RBC-Crypto" on how justified the 300,000 ruble limit is, how the limit control will be carried out, and whether it will limit the intermediaries themselves.
Why a Crypto Purchase Limit Was Established
The 300,000 ruble limit for non-qualified investors appears justified at this stage, believes Daria Petrukhina, a consultant at IPN Partners. She explained that this concerns investors who do not meet the criteria for a qualified investor, for example, having assets of less than 24 million rubles or an average annual income over the last two years of less than 12 million rubles (i.e., less than 500,000 rubles per month).
"If we translate the established limit into a more understandable value, it works out to about 25,000 rubles per month for crypto investments. Considering the high volatility of digital currencies and the fact that for a non-qualified investor, the crypto market is a relatively new and complex instrument, such a volume looks more like a reasonable protective barrier than a prohibition on investment," said Petrukhina.
It is important that the limit is established not directly by law, but by an act of the Bank of Russia, added the lawyer. She clarified that this gives the regulator greater flexibility: if market operations show that 300,000 rubles is too conservative or, conversely, an insufficient threshold, it can be adjusted without changing the law itself.
This limit is a starting market configuration, noted Petrukhina. According to her, the Central Bank will first be able to see how the new regulatory model works in practice, what kind of investor behavior it shapes, what risks actually arise, and only after that, if necessary, revise the parameters.
The regulator does not want to involve the mass retail investor in the crypto market as an instrument for earning and speculative trading, says Alexey Nasonov, partner at the law firm Nasonov & Partners, lecturer at HSE University on the "Blockchain Technologies and Legal Regulation" course. At the same time, the limit is calculated per intermediary separately, not cumulatively per person—formally, nothing prevents opening accounts with several brokers and collectively investing much more than 300,000 rubles, the expert noted. However, he agreed that the proposed restriction is more of a test.
A separate discussion is ongoing about what constitutes "using the limit": gross purchase turnover per year or the net balance on the account, added Nasonov. According to his information, market participants are asking for the net position to be considered so that an unsuccessful trade can be closed and reopened within the same limit.
How the Crypto Purchase Limit Will Be Controlled
Each intermediary controls the purchase volume of its client, says Petrukhina. She suggested that in practice, this will most likely be implemented through automatic restrictions in the trading system. That is, when a client approaches the established limit, the system should account for their previous purchases and prevent exceeding it. According to Nasonov, technically this can be implemented through the same infrastructure already used on the stock market.
Currently, information about transaction execution is confidential and under normal conditions is not subject to disclosure to another market participant; there is no system for exchanging information between intermediaries, clarified crypto expert and author of the Telegram channel GFiS Channel Taisiya Romanova. However, considering that the practice of transferring information to the Federal Tax Service is already being gradually introduced, and an individual's Taxpayer Identification Number (INN) will appear in transactions, later a centralized system for collecting information specifically about types of operations will be established, and possibly, if necessary, a cumulative limit on operations with several intermediaries will appear, the expert believes.
How the 300,000 Ruble Limit Will Affect the Business of Cryptocurrency Intermediaries
Certain restrictions will undoubtedly appear, but they will not necessarily lead to a significant deterioration in client service, believes Petrukhina. In her opinion, on the contrary, intermediaries will have additional motivation to develop services for client qualification. For a crypto platform, this means the opportunity to build a clear client trajectory: if an investor wants access to a larger volume of operations, they will have to meet the requirements for a qualified investor and confirm their level of experience, knowledge, or financial capabilities, the expert explained.
According to Nasonov, intermediaries will still be able to compete for clients based on transaction speed, tariffs, interface convenience, and set of additional products. But for loyalty programs tied to turnover volume (cashback, reduced commissions for volume, VIP statuses), a ceiling of 300,000 rubles per year will be a problem, noted the lawyer.
"For the retail segment, the loyalty model will be forced to shift from 'stimulating more purchases' to 'stimulating staying with one intermediary,' and to services around crypto: storage, conversion, analytics, and other services," said Nasonov.
What About Cryptocurrency Outside Russian Regulated Platforms
If a person acquires cryptocurrency outside the Russian regulated infrastructure, then such an operation itself may not fall under the 300,000 ruble restriction mechanism at all, says Petrukhina. For example, if the transaction lacks an element provided for by Russian legislation, in particular, the participation of a subject of the national payment system or the provision of an asset regulated in Russia (for example, rubles), this is already a different operational model, she explained.
The expert clarified that if an investor independently chooses a foreign platform, they go beyond the infrastructure that the Russian regulator directly controls, and in such a case, the state objectively cannot guarantee them the same level of protection as when working with a Russian licensed intermediary. And here a situation arises where the investor gets more opportunities but simultaneously independently assumes the risks of a foreign jurisdiction, the legislation of a specific country, and the rules and internal policies of the chosen crypto platform, explained the lawyer.
Technically, blockchain transactions are transparent and generally traceable, but this works for establishing the fact of a transfer, not for law enforcement: the Central Bank and Russian authorities have no leverage over foreign exchanges or non-custodial wallets if the owner moved an asset there, said Nasonov. But this is sufficient to identify the user at the entry point (purchase through a licensed intermediary) and for further analysis of their actions.
The limit on the investment amount is not the only restriction for "non-quals." The Bank of Russia also proposes to limit the list of cryptocurrencies available to them to bitcoin, ether, and the stablecoin $USDT. This condition is also contained in the regulator's directive of August 11, which has been put up for public discussion. At the same time, the State Duma expressed doubts about the need to allow $USDT, since the issuer of the Tether stablecoin blocks funds at the request of US authorities.
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