US Treasury’s Office of Foreign Assets Control (Ofac) On Thursday, a network of companies, exchanges and managers sanctioned to closed Russian crypto exchange guaranteed guaranteex and the ruble-backed stableecoin A7A5 and accused them of helping Moscow skirt international sanctions.
Garantex, founded in 2019 and once licensed in Estonia, dealt with more than $ 100 million in transactions associated with ransomware and darknet activity, OFAC said. US officials who worked with German and Finnish police seized their web domain and froze $ 26 million in March, which quickly got the creation of his subsequent Grinex to continue the operations, officials said.
Ofac said on Thursday that Grinex transferred customer funds from Garantex and used the A7A5 token to restore access after the attacks. Issued by Kyrgyzstan-based company Old Vector, A7A5 was created for Russian users of A7 LLC, a cross-border settlement platform, the agency said.
It is supported by Russia’s state -owned Promsvyazbank (PSB)Sanctioned for financing the defense industry, and Moldovan politician Ilan Shor, who was sentenced in a $ 1 billion banking case, reported the center of information support.
Ofac sanctioned Old Vector, A7 LLC and its subsidiaries A71 and A7 agent that blocked them from the US dollar -based financial system and prevent us from interacting with any of these devices or more than a dozen crypto addresses them.
The most important guarantors Sergey Mendelev, Aleksandr Mira Serda and Pavel Karavatsky were also sanctioned together with Mendelev’s companies Indefi Bank and abandoned, accused of allowing sanctioned Russian companies to act through crypto rails.
Treasury officials said the action coordinated with the US secret service and the FBI aimed to cut off digital asset channels used for ransomware and sanctions evasion.
“Utilization of cryptocurrency exchanges for money laundering and facilitates ransomware -attacks not only threatens our national security, but also stains reputation of legitimate virtual asset service providers,” John K. Hurley said under secretary of the Treasury of Terrorism and Financial Intelligence in a statement.
Crypto -rails to avoid sanctions
A7A5 has grown rapidly this year and is processing approx. $ 1 billion in July, according to Blockchain analysis company Elliptics report. The company said the token supports a “sanctions discretion” that allows Russian companies to make cross -border payments outside the traditional banking system.
Chainalysis estimated that token’s cumulative transaction volume exceeded $ 51 billion through July, warning that it offers “a new, crypto-native Avenue to bypass the ever-tightening sanctions against Russia.”
“The emergence of the A7A5 network, which is sanctioned today, further illustrates how Russia operates these alternative payment rails,” the company said.
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