As recently as June this year, local news media in Russia was reporting that the nation's government was set to legalize bitcoin and that this legalization would likely take place at some point during 2018. Fast-forward a couple of months, and it looks as though the policy makers are backpedaling on their decision.
Vedomosti, a daily business news reporting platform published in Moscow and one that was previously a collaborative effort between the Financial Times, The Moscow Times and Dow Jones, but is now entirely Russian owned, interviewed Deputy Finance Minister Alexei Moiseev this week.