Russian banks propose charging commissions to cryptocurrency holders

Russian banks may offset the costs of integrating a system to monitor the circulation of cryptocurrencies at the expense of users. This was stated by Garegin Tosunyan, president of the Association of Russian Banks (ARB), Izvestia reports.

A number of credit institutions have already announced their readiness to monitor the turnover of digital currencies. However, they argue that this will entail substantial costs for integrating the service, purchasing software, automation, expanding the financial monitoring staffing, and for the compliance department.

According to Tosunyan, banks will be able to offset the costs of implementing the new monitoring system by charging commissions to cryptocurrency holders.

In the first instance, the largest market players will take on the new sector, for whom the share of expenditure on technical support will be less onerous than for others. Creating such a system could take them several months, he suggests.

The ARB president added that there should be no technical problems for banks with transaction monitoring, conversion or settlement. He did not rule out that exchanges could participate in this process, setting quotes, demand and supply.

The government-approved concept for regulating cryptocurrency turnover provides strict obligations for all market participants. In addition to licensing exchanges and exchangers, all transactions are proposed to be conducted through the banking infrastructure.

According to Elvira Nabiullina, head of the Central Bank of Russia, the legalisation of cryptocurrencies and the involvement of commercial banks in the market pose a risk of broad involvement of financial institutions in money laundering and cashing out of funds.

Earlier, experts told ForkLog about the risks of executing bitcoin transactions via banks.

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