Izvestia: in January 2022, the Central Bank will begin testing a prototype of the digital ruble
In January 2022, the Central Bank of Russia will begin testing a prototype of the digital ruble, which will become the third equal payment method along with cash and non-cash. This is reported by Izvestia.
A digital ruble is an encoded sequence of data that is equivalent to a certain number of rubles. The Central Bank will deal with the issue of the digital ruble.
Antonina Levashenko, head of the Russian Center for Competence and Analysis of the OECD RANEPA Standards, said that simultaneously with the introduction of the digital ruble, it is planned to create an infrastructure for payments, money transfers and other transactions with a new type of currency. According to her, this will reduce acquiring fees and will become an additional incentive for accepting payments in digital rubles. She also noted that the introduction of the digital ruble will enable banks to expand the list of financial services and attract an additional client audience.
Igor Dodonov, an analyst at Finam, in turn, stressed that with the use of the digital ruble, businesses will be able to reduce the costs of conducting operations, and the state will have the opportunity to more accurately and promptly monitor the targeted use of funds in the financial system.
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Ekaterina Kosareva, Managing partner of the WMT Consult analytical agency, said that it will take a year or more to test the digital ruble. She believes that a number of factors should be studied first, including the degree of influence on inflation. Currently, it is assumed that the digital currency will not affect the growth of inflation. In addition, it is important to carefully introduce stimulating tools so that the new method of calculation is in demand not artificially, but naturally. Kosareva also noted that at the moment it is difficult to assess the degree of positive response from Russians, since the opinion of credit institutions was taken into account exclusively when developing the initiative.
Earlier, the head of the Central Bank, Elvira Nabiullina, stated that the regulator has no task to make the digital ruble the most popular form of money, people will evaluate its advantages gradually. Among the advantages of the new form of money, she called the ability to access a wallet where digital rubles are stored, regardless of the bank where the account is opened.