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The Central Bank of Russia announced this week that the institution might take the next step and regulate digital currencies in the near future to guarantee that the misuse of Bitcoin and other altcoins is punished in the country.

Georgy Luntovsky, the bank’s first deputy chairman, admitted that “one shouldn’t reject these instruments, perhaps they really have a future, but in our country the criminal world immediately starts to use everything new”.

The statement was made by Luntovsky during a banking conference in St. Petersburg (quoted by The Moscow Times), where the deputy chairman confirmed that the Russian government is currently discussing Bitcoin’s regulation.

Perhaps after a certain time we will make a decision about some legislative regulation of this issue.

It looks like Russia is ready to go back on the anti-Bitcoin stance announced earlier this year. Back in February, the word “prohibition” was even uttered with the Central Bank warning the Russians that transactions involving Bitcoin were highly speculative and carried large risks.

“The monitoring of the use of virtual currencies shows an increasing interest in them, including for the purpose of money laundering, profit obtained through illegal means”, said a statement released by the Prosecutor General’s Office released at the time.

Featured image from Wikimedia

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