Russia and Iran Partner on Stablecoin Initiative

Russia and Iran are reportedly working together to create a stablecoin backed by gold.

According to the Russian news agency Vedomosti, Iran is working with Russia to create a “token of the Persian Gulf region” that would serve as a payment method in foreign trade.

Russia recently started accepting Iraninan cargo shipments in a special economic zone called Astrakhan, and the proposed cryptocurrency would help to facilitate the transactions in the region.

Russia and Iran are among the countries that banned cryptocurrency transactions including Bitcoin and Tether, but Russia’s lower house of parliament recently announced a promise to start regulating crypto once again in 2023.

Russian lawmaker Anton Tkachev, a member of the Committee on Information Policy, Information Technology and Communications, stressed that a joint stablecoin project would only be possible once the digital asset market is fully regulated in Russia.

Bitcoin Back in Business?
Bitcoin rallied to over $21,000 on Jan. 13 and pushed beyond the $21,500 mark Wednesday. The precipitous gains are now demanding the attention of Butcoin skeptics, begging the question: where will Bitcoin go from here?

While we are still technically in a bear market, investor sentiment is improving. According to the Fear and Greed Index, a crypto-specific metric that measures sentiment using five weighted sources, investors’ feelings about the market hit a monthly high.

However, many analysts stress Bitcoin must continue to hover above the 21K mark in the preceding weeks before sentiments turn bullish.