March 2, 2022
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Crypto cannot evade sanctions?
Bitcoin jumped as much as 16% on Tuesday, continuing its sharp rebound as the Russian assault on Ukraine continues and the U.S. ratchets up sanctions.
The cryptocurrency was last up 6% in the previous 24 hours to $44,219.50, according to Coin Metrics. That rally comes after cryptocurrency prices plunged last week as risk assets such as stocks sold off following Russia’s invasion of Ukraine.
Ether jumped 5.4% to $2,980.38. Earlier in the day the crypto asset rose above $3,000.
Many have suggested Russia could use bitcoin, which is not owned or issued by a single authority like a central bank, to evade sanctions. Veteran investor Mark Mobius said that could be one reason behind bitcoin’s rise.
“I would say that’s the reason why bitcoin has shown strength now — because the Russians have a way of getting money out, getting their wealth out,” Mobius, founding partner of Mobius Capital Partners
Bitcoin’s rally began after the U.S. imposed further sanctions on Russia over the weekend targeting its central bank, on top of existing sanctions aimed at oligarchs and Russia’s sovereign debt to sever the country from the global financial system.
Sanctions cannot be evaded
Leah Wald, Valkyrie Investments CEO, said the idea that Russian markets participants would use crypto to get around sanctions “is highly likely but misguided, since it is far easier to track on-chain transactions than cash.”
Michael Rinko, venture associate at AscendEx, said it would be easier to censor the Russian government if it used bitcoin exclusively to manage its central bank reserves. That way, anyone could see all monetary flows into and out of the bank accounts owned by the central bank, due to Bitcoin’s public nature.
“At that point it would depend on Europe and the U.S. to pressure the biggest exchanges — Coinbase, FTX and Binance — to blacklist the addresses associated with Russia, and then no other major exchange would want to interact with funds that originated from those addresses,” Rinko said. “So they’d be able to freeze bitcoin funds or other crypto that touched a Russian account.”