Lithuanian cryptocurrency firm Payeer fined €9,3M for circumventing sanctions

Lithuanian Financial Crimes Investigation Service (FNTT) has fined Lithuanian cryptocurrency company Payeer €9,3M for violating EU sanctions and money laundering.

The FNTT said that Payeer allowed Russian customers to make transactions in Russian roubles and withdraw money from banks under EU sanctions through its platform. The company allowed individuals and legal entities from Russia to create cryptocurrency wallets, manage accounts, and store data.

Payeer violated international sanctions laws for more than a year and a half. During that time, the company acquired 213K customers and generated revenues of more than €164M. The FNTT also found that the company deliberately violated requirements related to customer identification — to avoid losing a significant amount of revenue from them.

Payeer was founded in 2012 in Russia by Evgenia Kosolapova. The company was liquidated in 2015, after which Payeer operators were registered in various countries, including the UK and Poland. In January 2023, after its license was revoked in Estonia, the company re-registered in Lithuania.

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