October 17, 2017 in the State Duma, the Government of the Russian Federation introduced in the Law on Currency Regulation and Currency Control the draft amendments, which will eliminate questions to determinate the currency residence of Russian citizens who permanently or temporarily reside abroad.

October 17, 2017 in the State Duma, the Government of the Russian Federation introduced in the Law on Currency Regulation and Currency Control the draft amendments, which will eliminate questions to determinate the currency residence of Russian citizens who permanently or temporarily reside abroad. According to the amendments, all Russian citizens will be considered currency residents, since at the moment Russians permanently or temporarily residing in another state for at least one year are recognized as non-residents, and as soon as they enter Russia for one day, they automatically become currency residents. Further, it is necessary to stay abroad for more than one calendar year to stop being a Russian currency resident. Now, according to the current Law, foreign residents have the duty to declare foreign accounts, and there are also restrictions on currency transactions. The unfulfilment of these requirements entails fines up to 100% of the amount of the foreign exchange transaction, if is considered illegal. According to the Explanatory Note to the Draft Federal Law “On Amendments to the Federal Law On Currency Regulation and Currency Control “, the Draft Law proposes to release the citizens of the Russian Federation from the obligation to notify the tax authorities of their accounts opened in banks outside the territory of the Russian Federation, also from restrictions on the performance of operations, as well as from the submission of reports to the tax authorities on the movement of funds on the foreign accounts of the resident individuals, if the stay of citizens of the Russian Federation outside the territory of it takes more than 183 days in the course of a calendar year, regardless of the number of entries to the territory of the Russian Federation in that year (addition in part 8 of Article 12 of the Law).