Russia's Central Bank to Offer Incentives for Digital Ruble Wage Payments

ChainCatcher report, according to Bits.media, the Central Bank of Russia has announced economic incentives to encourage the use of the digital ruble for salary payments. Starting January 1, 2027, commercial banks will receive a reward of 0.67 rubles for each transaction processing a company’s payment of wages or other contractual obligations to employees in digital rubles, with a minimum reward of 10 rubles per instruction list. According to the central bank’s design, if a company pays digital ruble wages to 10 employees, the bank receives 6.7 rubles in reward, which the central bank will top up to the minimum of 10 rubles; if 20 employees are involved, the reward will be 13.4 rubles. Meanwhile, the central bank has also approved service fees for the digital ruble platform: starting in early 2027, the fee per instruction for corporate transfers to individuals will be 1 ruble, with a minimum charge of 15 rubles per instruction list. Previously, Central Bank Governor Nabiullina stated that the digital ruble aims to enable state monitoring of financial operations such as government procurement contracts, while denying that the government will monitor peer-to-peer payments and assuring that use of the digital ruble will not be mandatory.