Justin Sun-owned Poloniex exchange has reached a $7.6 million settlement with the Office of Foreign Assets Control (OFAC) for alleged violation of sanctions.
OFAC imposes sanctions against some countries for certain national security goals. There is a prohibition on doing business or offering services to citizens of sanctioned countries.
OFAC Accused Poloniex of 65,942 Sanction Violations
An OFAC notice mentioned that Poloniex facilitated 65,942 transactions that violated the sanctions, between July 2,8 2015, and Sept. 2, 2019.
The total value of all the transactions was around $15.3 million from customers residing in sanctioned countries, namely Crimea, Cuba, Iran, Sudan, and Syria.
The notice reads:
Poloniex conveyed economic benefit to 232 persons in several jurisdictions subject to OFAC sanctions, and thereby harmed the integrity of multiple OFAC sanctions programs.
Moreover, OFAC alleges that Poloniex operated without a sanction compliance program from Jan 2014 to May 2015. The regulator further claimed that there were inconsistencies, even after the crypto exchange adopted a sanctions compliance program.
In November last year, BeInCrypto reported that OFAC fined Kraken Exchange for similar violations. Kraken had to pay over $360,000 as a settlement for apparent violations of sanctions on Iran.
OFAC also sanctioned two Russians in 2020 for stealing $17 million in crypto by mimicking the sites of major crypto exchanges like Gemini, Poloniex, Bittrex, and others.
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