Digital assets were treated passively – Newspaper Kommersant No. 207 (7408) dated 11/09/2022

A VTB Factoring survey showed that 63% of companies are not even ready to consider issuing digital financial assets (DFA). Meanwhile, the total volume of markets that could potentially become targeted for them is estimated by the company at the level of 30–35 trillion rubles. Experts name among the main obstacles to the development of the instrument, on the one hand, issues related to its regulation, and on the other hand, the lack of any understanding among businesses of “what it is all about”.

VTB Factoring interviewed 292 companies as part of a study on the CFA, which Kommersant got acquainted with. Of these, 60% are small and medium-sized businesses with revenues up to 2 billion rubles, 40% are the upper segment of medium and large businesses with revenues of more than 2 billion rubles. The survey showed that 63% of respondents are not ready to issue DFA. The main obstacles to the issuance of DFAs are low awareness – 57%, satisfaction with the available financial instruments (24%, it “can also be interpreted as the absence of valuable competitive advantages of the DFA in the current version,” the study says) and the complexity of the procedure itself (13%) .

At the same time, the share of those wishing to try to issue CFAs turned out to be more than those wishing to invest in them – 26% and 11%, respectively. Among the reasons that companies would consider issuing a digital financial market, two factors are in the lead: for 27% of respondents it is the need for additional external financing, for 20% it is professional curiosity. In terms of terms, 35% of potential issuers would issue CFA for 90-365 days, 28% – with circulation up to 90 days.

For the development of the market, it is necessary to remove restrictions: to more actively inform the business about this instrument and launch the secondary circulation of the CFA, which will balance the timing of the issue and investment, says Anton Musatov, CEO of VTB Factoring. In his opinion, the total volume of markets that could potentially become targets for the issuance of CFAs is 30–35 trillion rubles. at last year’s prices. “Even if we conservatively assume that at the initial stage the level of CFA penetration as a new financial instrument will not exceed 3–5%, then the volume of the CFA market may reach 1–2 trillion rubles. in the medium term,” the top manager emphasized.

The main obstacle to the release of the DFA remains the lack of “any understanding of why such a tool is needed at all and how to work with it,” says Sergey Mendeleev, head of InDeFi Smart Bank. In his opinion, the CFA law does not work outside of large corporations. Today, the market as a whole is not ready for new formats for working with investments, says Maria Telegina, a member of the commission for the legal support of the digital economy of the Moscow branch of the Russian Bar Association. According to her, the problem is the fear of investors, “especially against the backdrop of the current financial situation.”

Moscow Digital School lecturer, Lidings adviser Dmitry Kirillov believes that three factors hinder the development of the DFA market. The first of them is a modest register of DFA operators, which “may speak of an ultra-conservative approach of the Central Bank, which does not consider applicants for inclusion in the register worthy of entering the market; the absence of such bidders capable of building an efficient and secure platform for issuing DFAs; wait-and-see attitude of issuers and investors”. In the register of operators that can issue CFAs, only Atomize, Sberbank and Lighthouse. The second factor is the same lack of understanding by issuers and investors of the advantages of CFA over conventional instruments, the third is the regulatory closeness of the market.

A strong impetus to the development of the segment will be the placement of CFA in the traditional financial infrastructure, for example, with brokers, who by the end of the year will be able to offer retail clients access to such assets as part of over-the-counter trading, Denis Iordanidi, head of Lighthouse, believes. This, according to him, will increase the liquidity of the CFA. Other players in the CFA market, Atomize and Sberbank, did not answer “Kommersant”.

Only one thing can influence the development of the market – more comprehensive regulation of the entire digital industry, including cryptocurrencies, and the use of new approaches for this, emphasizes Andrey Tugarin, managing partner of GMT Legal. However, the expert admits, now there are no prerequisites that indicate that at least something will change in a year or two. Overall, he adds, “DFA regulation is in place, and if businesses don’t see a reason to enter the industry now, they won’t see it in a few years.”

Ksenia Kulikova