Russia To Legalize Bitcoin And Other Cryptocurrencies As Means Of Payment

The war between Russia and Ukraine has impacted the Cryptocurrency market negatively. There have been lots of sanctions on Russia by the United States, United Kingdom, and the European Union and it has affected the Russians’ economy negatively. The Russians’ Minister of Trade and Industry has revealed that the legalization of cryptocurrencies and Bitcoin as a means of payment will be very soon. How will the acceptance of cryptocurrency have an impact on the Russians’ economy? Russia supplies the European Union with 40% of its gas.

A few months ago, Russia considered accepting Bitcoin as a means of payment for oil and gas exportation. The Bitcoin price live is $29,249.74 on the Gate.io global cryptocurrency exchange platform at press time. The price is down by 3.19% in the last 24-hours. You can view the trading chart of BTC/USDT as well as other trading pairs with BTC. Russia has been home to cryptocurrencies and the President of Russia, Vladimir Putin, has been a supporter of cryptocurrency despite the Bank of Russia’s proposal to ban Bitcoin mining and cryptocurrency trading.

The Future Of Cryptocurrencies And Bitcoin In Russia

Russia has been a key player in Bitcoin mining, according to Cambridge University figures that show the country is a powerhouse in the field of crypto mining. In August 2021, Russia accounted for about 11% of the global processing power used for minting new units of bitcoin, according to the Cambridge Center for Alternative Finance, making it the third-biggest mining hub after Kazakhstan then. But a new report that was released in May as of the time of writing this article, shows that Russia has dropped from the top three mining hubs in the world. Could this be a result of the Russia-Ukraine invasion?

According to the data from Cambridge Center For Alternative Finance (CCFAF), the United State of America is leading with a 37.8% hash rate, followed by the second-largest Bitcoin hub China, despite the ban of cryptocurrency activities in 2021 by the government of China, who is leading by 21.1%, and this is followed by Kazakhstan whose BTC hash rate dropped from 18% to 13.2% between the months of August to January. The fourth and the fifth Bitcoin hub are now Canada and Russia respectively with a hash rate of 6.5% and 4.7% respectively. 

So Russia has seen a major decline from its third position as the top three biggest mining hubs with the BTC hash rate of 13.6 EH/s last August to 8.6 EH/s. Could this decline be attributed to the current Russia-Ukraine invasion? Can we say, war negatively impacts the general cryptocurrency market? You can learn more about Bitcoin as a means of payment on the buy/sell crypto at Gate.io cryptocurrency exchange.