The Deputy Finance Minister had this to say earlier in the week:
According to the state-backed news source TASS, Moiseev – who previously said that bitcoin should be classified as a kind of asset in Russia and limited to qualified investors – told reporters on Monday that "no regulator doubts that payments will be banned."
For him, there is no doubt that Bitcoin (and other cryptocurrency) payments will be banned. Read the article here.
Thoughts? Russia is probably the most infamous government for flip-flopping on Bitcoin regulation. This seems like more of the same. The market doesn't seem to be reacting to the news.