The market for digital financial assets (DFAs) will be able to attract significant investments only after merging with the cryptocurrency market, said the head of the financial policy department of the Ministry of Finance, Ivan Chebeskov, at the Fintech conference of the Vedomosti newspaper.
It is not yet possible to say that the industry is attracting a large number of investments, the official believes. “In our opinion, large investments in the market of digital financial assets will occur when we are able to combine what we call the crypto world and the world of digital financial assets, so that money from crypto assets can freely move to the digital financial assets market and thereby go towards investment in the economy,” – Chebeskov said.
In September at the Crypto Summit 2023 forum Chebeskov offered connect DFAs with decentralized finance (DeFi) – platforms through which you can make investments without the participation of intermediaries, that is, banks or brokers. In his opinion, the connection between digital financial services and DeFi is needed in order to use the liquidity that citizens already have in decentralized finance and crypto-assets. Then they will be able to invest in the Russian economy through an instrument such as the DFA, Chebeskov explained.
Now the digital asset market is too fragmented, there are already ten registered operators for issuing digital assets, the official stated. He suggests that the market will soon change greatly: the number of players will be reduced or a single platform aggregator will emerge that will have access to decentralized finance and crypto assets so that these assets can be used to invest in DFAs.
DFA are digital rights, including monetary claims, that are located in the information system. DFAs include monetary claims against the issuer, rights to participate in the capital of a non-public joint stock company, as well as rights to issue-grade securities.
The law on DFA came into force in Russia in January 2021. The list of operators for issuing DFA includes 10 companies: Atomize, Sberbank“Lighthouse”, Alfa Bank“Distributed Registry Systems” (“Masterchain”), “Tokens”, “Eurofinance Mosnarbank”, “SPB Exchange”, “Blockchain Hub” and “National Settlement Depository”.
