Binance was the only major crypto exchange among Bitzlato’s top counterparties, FinCEN said. It said the others to transact with Bitzlato were the Russian-language darknet drugs marketplace Hydra, a small exchange called LocalBitcoins and a crypto investment website called Finiko, which FinCEN described as “an alleged crypto Ponzi scheme based in Russia.” FinCEN did not detail the scale of the entities’ interactions with Bitzlato.
Bitzlato, whose website says it has been seized by French authorities, could not be reached by Reuters. Legkodymov, has not made any public comment since his arrest in Miami last week and did not respond to emailed requests for comment. Finland-based LocalBitcoins said it has never had “any kind of cooperation or relationship” with Bitzlato. Some peer-to-peer traders at LocalBitcoins “would also have been trading in BitZlato’s P2P market”, it said, adding that “there have practically been no transactions between LocalBitcoins and BitZlato since October 2022.”
“I wouldn’t call it a warning shot over the bow, I would call it a guided missile,” said Ross Delston, an independent American lawyer and former banking regulator who is also an expert witness on anti-money laundering issues, referring to FinCEN’s citing of Binance and LocalBitcoins.Binance moved over 20,000 bitcoin, worth $345.
Chainalysis, which is used by U.S. authorities to track illicit crypto flows, had warned in February of last year that Bitzlato was high risk. In a report, Chainalysis said nearly half of Bitzlato’s transfers between 2019 and 2021 were “illicit and risky,” identifying almost $1-billion in such transactions.
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Source: CryptoAmb - 🏆 22. / 68 Read more »
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