Participating banks expressed willingness to proceed with CBDC pilots.
The launch of Russia’s central bank digital currency (CBDC) pilot has been postponed indefinitely. However, participating banks have expressed their readiness to begin testing.
The CBDC pilot will not begin on April 1, as previously announced, as the specific legislation has only been passed in a first reading by the State Duma, the lower house of the federal parliament, state-run TASS reported on March 28. The legislation could be enacted in early May, TASS reported.
The number of private banks participating in the pilot also dropped from 15 to 13. Some bank employees will become test participants for CBDC retail payments, as well as Ingosstrakh, one of the country’s largest insurance companies.
Bank executives expressed enthusiasm for the project. Vitaly Kopysov, head of innovation at Sinara Bank, told reporters:
“The use of smart contracts should reduce the operational burden on banks and make transactions transparent, which will not only reduce the chances of misuse of government and bank funds but will also ultimately simplify the control of existing contracts.”
The upcoming pilot will involve real operations and consumers, but on a limited scale. The general public will not be able to participate in the first phase, as banks will enter the pilot with selected customers. After the first phase, the Central Bank of Russia intends to determine how to further expand the digital ruble.
The consumer CBDC pilot, initially scheduled for 2024, was brought forward as the Russian Central Bank seeks alternatives to the SWIFT payments system amid Western economic sanctions against Russia.