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While CoinZoom is a lesser known crypto exchange, it is one of
the first to halt new business operations in Russia, with most
exchanges thus far resisting calls to block Russian users
despite pleas from the Ukrainian government.
Coinbase, Kraken and Binance have said that while they will
comply with Western sanctions, they would not block Russian
users without a legal requirement to do so.
CoinZoom Chief Executive Todd Crosland said the company decided
to suspend new accounts because it was unclear how customers
would fund them given that major payment firms are pulling out
of Russia.
“It's a very fluid situation in Russia right now and it's very
fluid with regulators, so being able to fund your account with a
wire or a debit card, Mastercard, Visa — all of those funding
mechanisms are being basically eliminated for Russian customers
right now,” Crosland said in an interview.
CoinZoom is not blocking its existing Russian account holders
but it is screening them against sanctions lists, said Crosland.
On Saturday, U.S. payments firms Visa Inc and Mastercard Inc
said they were suspending operations in Russia over the invasion
of Ukraine.
Crypto exchanges have drawn criticism for refusing to block
Russian users, particularly after Ukraine's Vice Prime Minister
Mykhailo Fedorov last month asked crypto exchanges to block the
digital wallet addresses of Russian users.
Kraken CEO Jesse Powell on Twitter cited the "libertarian
values" of cryptocurrencies as one of the major reasons Kraken
would continue operating in Russia.
A spokesperson for Binance said in a statement that banning
access to crypto “would fly in the face of the reason why crypto
exists.”
(Reporting by Hannah Lang in Washington; editing by Michelle
Price and Jonathan Oatis)
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