Russian Energy Giant Gazprom Launches Blockchain-Powered ‘Digital Assets’

Gazprom, the majority Russian state-owned oil and gas titan, has launched a series of tradable, blockchain technology -powered “digital financial assets” (DFAs).

The firm is the latest Russian business heavyweight to foray into the nation’s fast-growing DFAs market.

The move appears to indicate that energy industry heavy-hitters are now ready to join commercial banks in the DFAs sector.

Gazprom Enters ‘Digital Financial Assets’ Sector

The Russian media outlet RBC reported that Gazprombank’s issuance is worth 2 billion rubles (over $23.5 million).

The gas giant has explained that its DFAs provide an annual yield of 21%. It will issue the coins on March 31.

The company will make the issuance via its banking arm, Gazprombank, using the Moscow Exchange’s DFA platform

Gazprombank said its DFAs were essentially “tokenized monetary claims on the issuer.” The firm plans issue a total of 2 million tokens, with each token worth 1,000 rubles (around $11.77).

The firm said the coins would mature on May 13, 2025, when each token will burn in exchange for a fiat sum of 1024.74 rubles ($12.06).

Interestingly, regulatory documents note that the Gazprom DFA “meets the characteristics of digital financial assets that can be acquired by non-qualified investors.”

This means that retail buyers can also trade the coins. This is often not the case with DFAs, many of which are only for the use of corporations and professional investors.

Gazprom’s offices in Moscow, Russia. (Source: Boevaya mashina [CC BY-SA 4.0])

Telecoms Behemoth Also DFA-keen

Gazprom’s move comes just days after a similar issuance from Rostelecom, another majority state-owned firm.

Rostelecom is Russia’s largest provider of telecoms and other digital services. It issued two of its own DFAs on the Moscow Exchange earlier this month.

The Central Bank issues DFA “information system operators (ISO)” with operating permits. One of the pioneers of the Russian DFA industry was Atomyze, a Hyperledger Fabric-based distributed ledger technology platform affiliated with the metals producer Norilsk Nickel.

DFA Investment Is Rising Fast, Says Bank

In February, Sberbank published a report claiming that the cumulative trading volume of Russia’s DFAs market has reached 684 billion rubles (around $8 billion).

Earlier this month, the same bank issued an index-type DFA that tracks the price of cocoa on the global market .

Last year, Gazprom announced the launch of a crypto mining subsidiary. This subsidiary is reportedly working on a 5,000-rig crypto mining center in the city of Veliky Novgorod, in the Novgorod Oblast .

Sources think that the center will reach full capacity by 2028, with Gazprom reportedly ready to spend around a $500 million on its crypto mining interests.