Russian Ministry of Finance: Proposes Lowering the Entry Threshold for Crypto Trading Pilot Programs

On September 5, it was reported that Alexey Yakovlev, Director of the Financial Policy Department of the Russian Ministry of Finance, stated that the threshold for obtaining the status of "special qualified" investors is planned to be lowered in order to expand the entities participating in organized cryptocurrency trading under the Central Bank's "Experimental Legal Regime" (ELR) framework. In March this year, the Russian Central Bank proposed a three-year pilot program, open only to "special qualified" investors. The current standard requires holding securities and deposits totaling at least 100 million rubles (approximately $1.2316 million), or an annual income of at least 50 million rubles (approximately $615,800) in the previous year; the specific extent of the reduction has not been disclosed, with the goal of improving accessibility under the premise of controllable risk.