The Russian Association of Cryptocurrencies and Blockchain (RACIB) and the Commission for the Legal Support of the Digital Economy of the Moscow branch of the Association of Lawyers of Russia (MO AYUR) have introduced a tool that allows you to determine the value of a digital asset by the weighted average value of its rate per day.

The system is proposed to be used in law enforcement practice, as well as for official business transactions and tax calculation.

BlockchainJournal found out what consequences the proposed methodology will entail for the business, and whether it can function in isolation from the draft law “On Digital Financial Assets” (“On CFA”).

Due to the fact that only a small share of exchanges conducts transparent and legitimate turnover and reporting, there were many questions about the accuracy of cryptocurrency rates, says Vladimir Smerkis, co-founder of the Tokenbox.io platform.

“As a rule, appraisers determine the cryptocurrency rate, referring to foreign resources, in particular, CoinMarketCap. However, in Russia, courts and competent authorities, using an “independent” assessment, often received a course from illegitimate online exchangers, and the RACIB initiative will partly facilitate their work. It is important that the sources of the “official” bitcoin price are legal and with sufficient turnover, without the possibility of manipulating the course, ”the expert emphasizes, adding that this is an important step on the path to decriminalization of cryptocurrencies.

The author of the idea, deputy chairman of the Commission on the Legal Support of the Digital Economy of the Ministry of Defense of the Republic of South Africa) Mikhail Uspensky confirmed that the investigating authorities will be able to use the cross-course.

“The media repeatedly wrote about cases of robbery and robbery, when a person came to a deal with bitcoins, and left with injuries. In order for the police to initiate criminal proceedings, the investigator must determine the extent of the damage. To do this according to the RACIB standard is much simpler and more understandable than according to the overseas CoinMarketCap, ” he noted in a comment on BlockchainJournal.

At the same time, Mikhail Uspensky emphasized that the tool can be used now, without waiting for the adoption of the draft law “On CFA”, which regulates the circulation of digital assets in the Russian Federation. However, Arseniy Poyarkov, member of the State Duma’s expert council on digital economy and blockchain technologies, does not agree with him.

“The initiative in itself to determine the“ official ”rate of Bitcoin and the cross-courses proceeding from it is correct, but absolutely useless. The determination of the anchor values of courses is the prerogative of the regulator. The dollar is set by the Bank of Russia on the stock exchange at 11:30. It could have been any other time, but the regulator decided that this time was optimal. Therefore, what will be the official bitcoin exchange rate for settlements between legal entities, payment of taxes, and so on, the state will decide. But only after it recognizes cryptocurrencies as a means of payment or financial asset, ”Poyarkov explained.

In his opinion, the tool will not work in isolation from the legislative consolidation of the status of cryptocurrency.

“With the same success, you can bilaterally agree on any course. This tool has no status, ”the expert concluded.

Despite the fact that the cross-rate system has long been used in classical trading and on the Forex market, in the case of cryptocurrencies, it may not clarify taxation issues, says Dmitry Machikhin, CEO of Cashtan gaming wallet.

“There are a lot of questions on what to do with this cross-course and how to really consider the tax base. For example, it is unclear what exchanges are being traded and why precisely on them. Before drawing conclusions, I would like to see and test the mechanism myself. We, in turn, have repeatedly spoken out that cryptocurrency assets need reasonable taxation. At the same time, there is no certainty that regulatory authorities clearly understand how blockchain works and how to identify the subject of taxation, ” he said in a comment to BlockchainJournal.

It is noteworthy that the list of exchanges for which RACIB proposes to calculate the weighted average bitcoin exchange rate is not constant. Their choice is based on "market criteria, taking into account reputation and market activity." One of the criteria for the “good business reputation” of the exchange is whether it has a license from the regulator in the jurisdiction of its core business. The list currently includes Binance, Bitfinex, BitMEX, Bittrex, Exmo, Kraken and OKEx.

Recall that the system proposed by the RAKIB every 30 seconds during the day requests the bitcoin exchange rate from several exchanges and fixes its weighted average value as of 23:59:40 Moscow time. Then it calculates the cross rate to the dollar and the ruble.

Subscribe to BlockchainJournal news on Telegram: BlockchainJournal Feed – the entire news feed, BlockchainJournal – the most important news and polls.