Category: cryptocurrency

The company attributed the decision to the latest round of Western sanctions against Russia, saying that transactions in dollars and euros will be unavailable to any individuals residing in Russia regardless of nationality.  

The exchange also banned users based in the EU from making transfers in Russian rubles via the platform, according to media reports. When trying to make a transaction in rubles, the platform prompts users to select a ‘local currency’ for P2P.

“In order to continue using Binance P2P, users can choose other available fiat currencies,” a representative of the exchange told Forbes Russia. 

India has imposed money-laundering regulations on trade in cryptocurrencies, according to a government release published on Tuesday, in the latest step to tighten control of the sector. A range of crypto transactions, namely the exchange, transfer, safekeeping and administration of virtual assets, now fall under the Prevention of Money-Laundering Act (PMLA), the notification from the Ministry of Finance published by The Gazette of India states. The PMLA obliges financial institutions to keep a record of all transactions for ten years, provide the records to officials in necessary, and to verify clients’ identity.

Crypto exchanges Huobi and KuCoin, both based in Seychelles, failed to take steps to prevent sanctioned Russian banks from using their platforms, according to a report from the blockchain analytics firm Inca Digital provided to POLITICO. Both exchanges still allow traders to transact with debit cards issued by sanctioned Russian banks, including Sberbank, on their peer-to-peer platforms, according to the report, which will be published later today.

While neither exchange actually accepts funds from blacklisted banks, letting crypto buyers trade with each other using accounts with sanctioned institutions represents a “direct violation of U.S. and European sanctions with a little bit of a loophole,” Inca CEO Adam Zarazinski said in an interview.

Binance is considering ending business relationships with banks and services firms amid heightened scrutiny.

A complaint was unsealed this morning in federal court in Brooklyn charging Anatoly Legkodymov, a Russian national and senior executive of Bitzlato Ltd. (Bitzlato), a Hong Kong-registered cryptocurrency exchange, with conducting a money transmitting business that transported and transmitted illicit funds and that failed to meet U.S. regulatory safeguards, including anti-money laundering requirements. Legkodymov was arrested last night in Miami…

A federal district court in San Diego ordered today that over $17 million in restitution be distributed to approximately 800 victims from over 40 different countries due to their investment losses in BitConnect, a massive cryptocurrency investment scheme, which defrauded thousands of investors worldwide. On Sept. 16, 2021, Glenn Arcaro, 44, the top U.S.-based promoter for BitConnect, pleaded guilty to…

FTX founder Sam Bankman-Fried pleaded not guilty in Manhattan federal court Tuesday to charges that he cheated investors and looted customer deposits on his cryptocurrency trading platform as a judge set a tentative trial date for October. Bankman-Fried, 30, denied charges accusing him of illegally diverting massive sums of customer money from FTX to make lavish real estate purchases, donate…

A Manhattan federal judge known for swift decisions and a no-nonsense demeanor during three decades of overseeing numerous high-profile cases was assigned Tuesday to Sam Bankman-Fried’s cryptocurrency case. The case was relegated to Judge Lewis A. Kaplan after the judge originally assigned recused herself because her husband worked for a law firm that had done work related to Bankman-Fried’s collapsed…

A federal grand jury in Manhattan returned an indictment today charging Samuel Bankman-Fried, aka SBF, 30, of Stanford, California, with conspiracy to commit wire fraud, wire fraud, conspiracy to commit commodities fraud, conspiracy to commit securities fraud, conspiracy to commit money laundering, and conspiracy to defraud the Federal Election Commission and commit campaign finance violations. The charges in the indictment…

The investigation and enforcement of potential sanctions violations by crypto exchanges is an area of focus in the US at present.  The US Department of the Treasury’s Office of Foreign Assets Control’s (OFAC) recent settlement with Kraken, a global virtual currency exchange, is the most recent OFAC case demonstrating the risks for virtual currency platforms that process transactions without comprehensive…

On November 28, 2022, the Office of Foreign Assets Control (“OFAC”) announced a settlement agreement with Payward, Inc., known as Kraken (“Kraken”), a United States-based virtual currency exchange. Kraken agreed to pay $362,158.70 to resolve its potential civil liability for 826 apparent violations of the Iranian Transactions and Sanctions Regulations (“Apparent Violations”). The settlement amount is significantly less than the…

Stuart Alderoty, General Counsel for Ripple, stated in a tweet that BlockFi’s problem is another regulation by-enforcement success story of the SEC. The counsel asserted that the $100 million enforcement fine that the SEC charged BlockFi contributed to the firm’s bankruptcy. He also raised questions about the $270 million loan outstanding and some unknown amounts owed to BlockFi by FTX….

Please note that Bittrex is a crypto exchange / trading platform. Crypto exchanges are like merchants that sell and trade cryptocurrencies, while cryptocurrencies (like Monero, Bitcoin, ZCash, etc.) are the ‘products’ sold by the merchants. The failure of a merchant does not entail that there is a failure in the product. Cryptocurrency experts recommend that if you are going to…

On September 16, 2022, the U.S. Department of the Treasury (“Treasury”) published three reports in response to a March 2022 Executive Order concerning the development of digital assets.  The reports address the future of money and payments; implications for consumers, investors, and businesses; and the illicit financing risks of digital assets.  Secretary Yellen described the reports as identifying the challenges…

On August 8, 2022, the U.S. Department of the Treasury’s Office of Foreign Assets Control (“OFAC”) sanctioned virtual currency mixer Tornado Cash for having laundered more than USD 7 billion worth of virtual currency since its founding in 2019.  This includes over USD 455 million worth of stolen virtual currency associated with the Lazarus Group, a “Democratic People’s Republic of…

In a letter dated August 16, 2022, U.S. Sen. Pat Toomey addressed FDIC acting chairman Martin Gruenberg to inquire about some recent FDIC actions that came to light by way of whistleblower reporting. Toomey said that the affected parties came forward to reveal that their banks received letters from the FDIC discouraging the bank from doing business with legitimate crypto…