Binance Handled $346M In Bitcoin Transactions For Russian Exchange Bitzlato: Reuters

Summary:

• Binance processed 205,000 transactions between May 2018 and January 2023, per a Chainlysis report from Tuesday.
• The leading crypto exchange also reportedly facilitated $90 million in BTC trading volume for Bitzlato post-August 2021, after announcing plans to beef up anti-money laundering checks.
• Bitzlato is under investigation by the U.S. Justice Department and its Founder Anatoly Legkodymov was charged with money laundering.

On-chain security firm Chainlysis reported on Tuesday that Binance facilitated over $345.8 million in Bitcoin trading volume for investigated Russian crypto exchange Bitzlato. Bitzlato was accused of money laundering by the U.S. Department of Justice and its Founder Anatoly Legkodymov was arrested on money laundering charges. 

Bitzlato fell under scrutiny for allegedly handing $700 million in illegal wealth in an operation that prosecutors said: “fueled a high-tech axis of crypto crime”. The platform was accused of adopting lax background checks and acting as a primary money laundering front connected to Russian crime organizations. 

According to the Reuters report on the matter, Binance was responsible for some 205,000 digital asset transactions between May 2018 and mid-January 2023 when American authorities cracked down on Bitzlato. 

The U.S Treasury’s Financial Crimes Enforcement Network (FinCEN) also named Changpeng Zhao’s crypto exchange was one of three major counterparties for the Russian platform. 

Furthermore, the report said that $90 million of BTC transactions were processed after August 2021. Notably, Binance unveiled plans to implement tight anti-money laundering (AML) checks and improved Know-Your-Customer (KYC) standards in the same month. 

Binance Confirms Error Involving B-Tokens And Customer Asset Storage

A Bloomberg report said that crypto’s largest centralized exchange erroneously stored customer funds and token collateral in the same wallet. The leading exchange kept collateral for tokens issued on its Binance Smart Chain or BNB Chain network and user assets in a “single wallet called Binance 8”.

It’s unclear when CZ’s company spotted the issue but the juggernaut crypto platform is already working to resolve the matter, per the report. 

Binance 8 is an exchange cold wallet. Collateral assets have previously been moved into this wallet in error and referenced accordingly on the B-Token Proof of Collateral page. Binance is aware of this mistake and is in the process of transferring these assets to dedicated collateral wallets.