Bitcoin (BTC) miners based in Russia reportedly mined billions of dollars worth of the top crypto asset by market cap last year.

According to a new Izvestia report, Sergey Bezdelov, the director of the Russian Industrial Mining Association, said at this month's Eastern Economic Forum that 54,000 Bitcoin worth over $3 billion were mined within the borders of Russia in 2023.

The Bitcoin mining activities generated an additional 50 billion rubles, or $552 million, in tax revenue for the Russian government, according to Bezdelov.

Bezdelov also believes that new crypto regulations officially permitting Bitcoin and digital asset mining, which were signed into law last month by Russia's President Vladimir Putin, could attract increased investment in mining activities.

According to an April 2023 report by Russian news publication Kommersant, Russia emerged as the second-largest Bitcoin miner of all countries around the world for the first time, while the United States continued to sit at number one.

Russia has also made other recent advancements in crypto adoption.

Last month, Bloomberg reported that the Russian government wants to use digital tokens for cross-border transactions to help ease payment difficulties for its companies that have been affected by international sanctions placed on the country.

According to people "with knowledge of the matter who asked not to be named discussing private information," Russia will attempt to use the National Payment Card System (NSPK) to trade rubles and crypto assets when testing payments and the exchange platform.

Also in August, Reuters reported that lawmakers in Russia passed a bill that will enable the nation to use cryptocurrency in international trade, which is expected to go into effect this month.