Russia’s raids in Moscow City, Payment Center, and the online gambling legalization plan: connected moves or not

While law enforcement has been raiding crypto exchangers in Moscow City, the federal conversation has been moving in the opposite direction: toward legalizing online gambling. For PSPs and high-risk merchants, the sequence matters because it points to pressure on gray payment rails, cash-out points, and traffic sources at the same time.

1. In January 2025, the Ministry of Internal Affairs shut down the illegal payment system Rapidpay, which handled 700 million rubles in turnover and served crypto exchangers, bookmakers, and casinos. That is not a niche cleanup; it is a direct hit on payment infrastructure used by multiple high-risk verticals.
2. In September 2025, large-scale raids in Moscow City led to more than $10 million being seized, and all crypto exchangers were shut down. The same cluster reappeared in August 2026, when the FSB detained more than 20 employees of crypto exchangers in City, including Donald-capital, which reportedly had a turnover of $1-2 million per day. In October 2026, there were fresh raids with sledgehammers, plus detentions of couriers and money changers.
3. Separately, the beneficiary of PaySelection and Payment Center, Arsen Akopyan, was detained together with 20 employees. For the market, the signal is straightforward: the authorities are not only going after front-line operators, but also the people behind the business.
4. On the policy side, in January 2026 the Finance Ministry proposed that Putin legalize online casinos, with a potential of up to 100 billion rubles in annual tax revenue. In September 2026, the State Duma prepared a law targeting casino streamers, with fines of up to 7 million rubles. The sequence matters: first the payment pipes, then the cash-out points, then the marketing channels.
5. The logic, as presented in the source, is a five-step squeeze: strike payment infrastructure such as Rapidpay, Payment Center, PaySelection, and Donald-capital; hit cash-out points in Moscow City; cut traffic from streamers; create a single online-casino operator under the Federal Tax Service; and redirect money into the tax base instead of letting it leave the country. For high-risk PSPs, that means the gray market is being squeezed from three sides at once.

On paper, legalization looks like a market-opening move. In practice, the model described here is a tightly controlled one: not a free-for-all, but a shift from informal rails to a regulated channel with far less room for improvisation. That is the part payment providers should actually care about.