CoinList, a cryptocurrency exchange based in the United States, has reached a settlement of $1.2 million with the Office of Foreign Assets Control (OFAC) of the U.S. Treasury, following claims of facilitating transactions that breached U.S. sanctions.
On Dec. 13, OFAC reported that CoinList had processed 989 transactions from April 2020 to May 2022 involving users in Crimea, a region under Russian occupation that was previously part of Ukraine. The agency described these activities as “non-egregious” and not voluntarily self-reported by CoinList.
According to OFAC’s findings, CoinList’s screening measures failed to identify users who registered as residents of non-embargoed countries but provided addresses in Crimea. The agency noted:
“[CoinList’s] screening procedures failed to capture users who represented themselves as resident of a non-embargoed country but who nevertheless provided an address within Crimea,” highlighting that nearly all of the 89 account holders specified ‘Russia’ as their country of residence but provided Crimean addresses upon account opening.
OFAC determined that CoinList was aware or should have been aware that these transactions likely involved Crimean residents, thus violating U.S. sanctions and indirectly benefiting the region. Despite this, CoinList collaborated with U.S. authorities, and the transactions in question constituted only a small fraction of the exchange’s overall volume.
In response to Russia’s annexation of Crimea in 2014, then-U.S. President Barack Obama implemented sanctions on the region, followed by additional sanctions against Russia after its military invasion of Ukraine in February 2022.
CoinList is not the first U.S. crypto firm to face OFAC enforcement for sanctions violations. Poloniex previously settled for $7.6 million due to over 65,000 alleged violations, including those related to Crimea. Similarly, Binance’s $4.3 billion settlement with U.S. officials also encompassed allegations of sanctions breaches.