The mass launch of the digital ruble, scheduled for July 1, is postponed, Elvira Nabiullina reported at the annual meeting with the management of the Bank of Russia.
According to her, the participants of the pilot project, including 15 banks and about 30 companies, asked to postpone the deadline. They risk not being able to launch operations on time, since the legal basis of the project has not been fully defined, and the platform itself is still being finalized.
It was previously planned that from July 1, 2024, all major banks would begin offering clients operations with the digital ruble. However, more time has now been allocated to finalize the details in pilot mode, and a new date for the mass launch has not yet been determined.
The Central Bank has been working on the digital ruble project since 2021. In August 2023, the law on digital currency came into force, after which a pilot project began with real transactions for individuals and legal entities.
At the start, 22 organizations and 600 people participated in the pilot project, but now 12 banks, including Sberbank, VTB, Alfa-Bank and T-Bank, 1 companies and 200 people are connected to the system.