Russia has been suffering from the shortage of graphic cards that can be used to mine cryptocurrencies, which has caused the prices of these components to double in the country. However, it was not the citizens who obtained these cards, but the State Bank Sberbank, who admitted having bought them and apologized for having caused the shortage.
Sberbank apologized for buying graphics cards
Sberbank is the largest bank in Russia and the third largest in Europe, and 60% of its shares belong to the government of that nation. According to its first vice president, Alexander Vedyakhin, the bank's research laboratory has been behind the drought period of graphic cards in Russia. In statements offered to Ria Novosti last Saturday, the official said:
The reason for the deficit in the graphics card market was Sberbank, buying these equipment for its Artificial Intelligence laboratory.
When he continued explaining the reasons for the irrational purchase of graphics cards, Vedyakhin revealed that the bank invests a lot in technology, and, in that sense, apologized for the market shortage of these cards because they were acquired for development purposes. However, he said that the shortage will soon be over because they have bought everything they need.
While Sberbank has stated that it is not yet ready to include cryptocurrencies into the institution's system, the bank has admitted having studied them in detail. This was stated by Stanislav Kuznetsov, vice president of the executive board of Sberbank, who in a recent interview said that they studied cryptocurrencies to protect themselves from fraudsters.
Chinese online trading platform Aliexpress, reported last June that there was an increase in demand for graphics cards in Russia for cryptocurrency mining, which amounted to even 150 percent.
Before the statements of the Sberbank official, the RT media reported that the recent increase in the value of Bitcoin has caused a jump in the demand for video cards used in mining. In addition, he assured that people buy up to 600 cards at a time, which has resulted in an increase in its price of almost 80 percent in recent months.