Bitcoin Volumes in Russia Reach the Highest Level since May 2021

With the growing uncertainty regarding the future of Russia’s financial ecosystem, investors have started moving towards Bitcoin and other digital currencies. On Thursday, Ruble-denominated Bitcoin volumes reached the level of 1.5 billion, which is the highest figure in nearly 10 months.

Russian investors are among the biggest crypto holders in the world. According to an estimate, Russians own approximately 12% of the global crypto assets. Due to the recent outbreak of a war between Russia and Ukraine, the country’s leading Bitcoin investors have accelerated the on-chain movement of digital assets.

Data from Kaiko, a leading crypto research and analysis platform, indicates that Ruble-denominated cryptocurrency volumes have increased across the market. According to Clara Medalie, Kaiko's research analyst, the trading activity was concentrated on digital exchange Binance.

"Bitcoin-Ukrainian hryvnia volume has also spiked, but not as high as October levels. BTC-UAH only trades on 2 exchanges: Binance and LocalBitcoin,” Medalie told crypto news platform CoinDesk in an email.

During the latest week, volumes related to USDT/RUB reached 1.3 billion, which is the highest level in almost 8 months.

Bitcoin Token Circulation

While Bitcoin took a significant hit due to the recent conflict between Russia and Ukraine, its overall network activity presented a mixed picture. On 28 February 2022, non-zero BTC addresses reached an all-time high of 40 million. However, BTC’s token circulation also spiked recently.

“Bitcoin’s token circulation hit a 9-month high, revealing just how polarized traders have become with the war. This circulation spike was similar to Black Thursday back in March 2020, where crypto traders sold at the bottom at the beginning of COVID,” on-chain analysis platform Santiment noted.

With a market capitalization of over $730 billion, Bitcoin is still holding the price level of $38,000. However, BTC’s weekly price performance shows a decline of almost 2%, according to the data published by Coinmarketcap.