Russia’s new crypto market is taking shape without P2P, with banks and licensed intermediaries in the middle

Less than two months after Russia’s crypto law took effect on 1 September, the domestic market is already being wired around licensed intermediaries, bank-controlled flows, and a ban on P2P (peer-to-peer) transfers from 1 July 2027. For PSPs, banks, and exchanges, the important part is not the rhetoric: it is that the country’s “internal” crypto circulation is being built as a tightly closed loop.

1. The Central Bank has clarified that from 1 July 2027 Russian users will not be able to use P2P transactions for crypto. The regulator says the list of permitted transactions and operations with digital currencies “does not provide for” transactions “between individuals” after that date. In practice, that means the current model of buying crypto through P2P platforms and moving funds from one private card to another is being pushed out of the legal perimeter.
2. According to Leila Tagieva, head of digital law practice at SSP-Consult, if a citizen previously bought USDT on a P2P platform by sending rubles to a private individual’s card, the servicing bank will now be required to refuse the payment if it suspects the recipient is not a legal exchange operator. That is the mechanism banks and PSPs will have to apply: the bank is no longer just processing a transfer, it is judging whether the counterparty sits inside the licensed market.
3. Maxim Bokov, chief AML/KYT analyst at Shard, says the law also blocks the current form of off-exchange crypto circulation, including P2P deals to and from exchanges and the ability to withdraw to a personal “cold” wallet that is not tied to an exchange. On paper the user still owns crypto; in practice, the movement options are being narrowed to the licensed channel.
4. Yury Brisov, partner at Digital & Analogue Partners, says crypto will effectively be bought only from large banks such as Sberbank or VTB, which are already in the registers of crypto-market intermediaries. His comparison is an open metal account: the user owns the asset “on paper,” but does not receive the physical bars. That is the point of the new setup — custody and circulation move into the banking layer.
5. Victor Pershikov, an expert in financial markets, digital currencies, and regulation, says P2P will not disappear, but it will change. One-off transactions will move underground, while professional P2P merchants will either register as exchangers or leave the market, because the risk will become criminal. For high-risk PSPs, that is the key operating signal: the informal rail is being compressed, but demand does not vanish with the rulebook.

For now, private individuals cannot trade crypto inside Russia’s internal loop in any meaningful way because the paperwork is not ready. That means the market is being constructed before it is fully usable, with the Central Bank, licensed intermediaries, and major banks setting the terms of access.