Digital currency has ceased to be an "exotic" feature of the financial market. It is already used in settlements, in investment structures and in cross-border transfers. The next practical stage is the use of crypto-assets in transactions with real assets, including commercial property, whether by direct settlement or through derivative contractual structures. Two questions are critical for the market:
1. whether claims of that kind can be protected effectively in court, and
2. where the limit lies on the restrictions the state may impose.
That is why we draw attention to the Judgment of the Constitutional Court of 20 January 2026, No. 2-P. It sets out markers that in effect frame the future regulation of cryptocurrency, from the standpoint of property rights and of access to a court.
What the dispute was about. A citizen acquired USDT and transferred it to a third party "for management", but the asset was not returned. The courts refused protection not on the merits, but on a formal ground: the claimant had not shown that he had informed the state of his holding of digital currency and of his transactions in it, as Federal Law No. 259-FZ requires.
The position of the Constitutional Court. The Court stated that the duty to notify is established in form, but that a clear and workable mechanism has in fact been built mainly for cases of mining. For an ordinary holder, who acquires or exchanges digital currency, the procedure is far from obvious, and does not allow a person acting in good faith to meet the "condition of entry" to court.
That is the key defect in the way the rule is applied. A condition of access to court is laid down, but no real means of complying with it is defined, and the gap is then used as a ground for refusing to protect property rights.
What the Constitutional Court decided
for persons who obtain digital currency by mining, the relevant "filter" is on the whole permissible;
for persons who acquire digital currency otherwise than by mining, it is unconstitutional to bar them from court with a formal "you did not notify";
until the law is amended, the courts must hear such claims where there is evidence that the digital asset was lawfully obtained or lawfully used.
Comment by Sergei Pivovarchik, managing partner of Consul Group:
The Constitutional Court confirmed two practical points that matter for the commercial property market:
• Cryptocurrency is an asset with property value, and disputes about it, including where it is an element of the settlement or of the security, cannot be nullified by a bare reference to the lack of a formal notification, where no clear mechanism for giving that notification exists.
• At the same time, the Court expressly left the legislator a wide discretion. Regulation will set the limits of the dealings in cryptocurrency that are to be allowed. A structure of "real estate for cryptocurrency" is therefore possible in principle, but the regime may be tightened, and the legal risks have to be built in from the start, above all on proof of the source of the asset and on compliance.
Follow Consul Group on Telegram.
.jpg)
Analytics
Events