Russia has indicated that it is considering digital currencies or cryptocurrency as a form of payment for oil and gas, according to a BBC report.
This is coming on the back of the current Russia Ukraine war and the sanctions heaped on Vladimir Putin’s Russia.
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Pavel Zavalny, the head of the parliamentary energy committee of Russia, said, “Friendly countries that buy oil from Russia could pay in their local currencies or cryptocurrencies.”
He did, however, point out that for the unfriendly ones, President Vladimir Putin stated earlier this week that Russia will require payment for gas in rubles which means the basic monetary unit of Russia and some other former republics of the USSR.
According to Russian media, when asked about friendly countries, Zavalny stated that China and Turkey were among the friendly countries that could switch to local currencies.
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“We have long proposed to China that we switch to settlements in national currencies for rubles and yuan,” Zavalny said. He went on to say, “With Turkey, it will be lira and rubles, and you can also trade bitcoins.”
Similarly, an energy researcher told the BBC that bitcoin could be used as an alternative to fiat currencies in payments for Russian oil and gas, but it is a highly volatile alternative.
“Russia is feeling the impact of unprecedented sanctions very quickly,” David Broadstock, senior research fellow at Singapore’s Energy Studies Institute, told the BBC.
“There is a need to shore up the economy, and Bitcoin is seen as a high growth asset in many ways,” Broadstock said.
“The value of the digital currency has fluctuated by up to 30 per cent since the beginning of the year, compared to just 5 per cent for the US dollar,” he said.
