Crypto Industry Lobbies Against Bills Targeting Russian Oligarchs Evading Sanctions Using Cryptocurrency – According to CNBC, the Blockchain Association has been pushing US lawmakers against two legislation aimed at preventing Russian oligarchs from utilizing cryptocurrencies to circumvent sanctions imposed after Russia invaded Ukraine.
The first is the “Russian Digital Asset Sanctions Compliance Act of 2022,” a House bill. The other is the “Digital Asset Sanctions Compliance Enhancement Act of 2022,” a Senate bill supported by crypto skeptic Senator Elizabeth Warren.
The proposals provide the Biden administration the power to restrict cryptocurrency exchanges in the United States from handling payments from Russia. They would also allow US authorities to impose sanctions on overseas exchanges that facilitate transactions involving sanctioned Russian individuals or businesses.
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Ava Labs, AAVE, Blockchain Capital, Anchorage Digital, Bitdeer, Blockfi, Brevan Howard, Chainalysis, Circle, Digital Currency Group, Crypto.com, Dragonfly Capital, Ripple, Silvergate,Etoro, Grayscale, Kraken, Voyager, Terra, and Wicklow Capital are among the more than 70 crypto platforms represented by the organization.
The group is attempting to persuade lawmakers that wealthy Russians are not using cryptocurrency to circumvent sanctions.
According to the publication, Curtis Kincaid, a spokesperson for the Blockchain Association, the organization is attempting to persuade lawmakers to “separate fact from fiction regarding Russia’s incapacity to transfer substantial sums of money via crypto transactions in order to escape sanctions.”
The association’s policy leader, lawyer Jake Chervinsky, said:
These bills aren’t aimed at Russian oligarchs, who don’t (and can’t) utilize crypto to avoid sanctions. They go after law-abiding US crypto firms for no obvious reason other than Senator Elizabeth Warren’s crusade against a technology she doesn’t understand.
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While some lawmakers are concerned about the use of cryptocurrency to avoid sanctions, many experts believe that cryptocurrency is not an efficient instrument for evading penalties. “We don’t see crypto being utilized in a large-scale fashion to avoid sanctions,” a US Treasury official said in March.
