Russia locks in retail crypto rules, Bitcoin and Ether trading starts Nov. 17

Russia's central bank has locked in the rulebook for retail crypto trading, and the clock is now ticking toward a Nov. 17 start date. Exchanges will be able to offer Bitcoin, Ether and Tether USDt to ordinary Russians from that day. It's the clearest signal yet that Moscow wants digital assets trading inside state-supervised walls, not outside them.

The limits are strict for regular investors. Anyone who isn't a qualified investor can buy up to 300,000 rubles worth of crypto a year, roughly $3,700, and that cap applies through each intermediary — so brokers, asset managers and crypto exchange providers each count separately. Qualified investors skip the ceiling entirely. Everyone, regardless of status, has to pass a mandatory test before they can trade a single coin.

The scaffolding went up fast. President Vladimir Putin signed the underlying law on Aug. 4, creating a regulated crypto market under central bank oversight. A week later the Bank of Russia floated its draft rules, picking BTC, ETH and USDT for public trading based on market cap, average daily volume and at least five years of price history on foreign exchanges. The law took effect Sept. 1, and by October the regulator had cleared Sberbank, the country's biggest bank, to offer crypto exchange services.

Next on the calendar: the Moscow Exchange. Russia's largest securities exchange and a publicly traded company is preparing to launch crypto trading on Dec. 1, starting with pilot transactions in those same three assets. That puts a state-adjacent heavyweight directly into a market the central bank intends to keep on a short leash.

The leash is tightening elsewhere too. Direct peer-to-peer crypto trading gets banned starting July 1, 2027, according to the Bank of Russia, and transfers from regulated digital accounts into self-custody wallets are already blocked. Paying for goods and services with crypto remains off the table as well. The message is blunt: buy and hold through approved middlemen, or don't buy at all.