With no end in sight of the Russian invasion of Ukraine, the U.S Treasury has now imposed sanctions on Russian crypto miners.
The Treasury Department’s Office of Foreign Assets Control, or OFAC, said that it was adding Bitriver AG and 10 other Russian subsidiaries of Bitriver AG to the list of “Specially Designated Nationals”.
Firms and companies listed under this tag usually have their assets blocked by the OFAC and “U.S. persons are generally prohibited from dealing with them”.
Bitriver AG is the holding company of Bitriver, a virtual mining company founded in 2017 and operating out of three offices across Russia.
This move from the U.S government comes to ensure that “no asset, no matter how complex, becomes a mechanism for the Putin regime to offset the impact of sanctions.”
The US government feels that Russia has a comparative advantage in crypto mining owing to its vast energy resources reserve and the cold climate.
Vast server farms developed by companies like Bitriver that sell virtual currency mining capacity internationally, help Russia monetize its natural resources.
However, these mining companies still require imported computer equipment and fiat payments, making them vulnerable to US sanctions.
The Russian invasion of Ukraine is about to enter its third month. Several countries across the world have been imposing sanctions on Russia since the war started in an effort to weaken their economy.
The European Union recently imposed additional sanctions against Putin’s regime by executing the fifth package of restrictive measures against him. The EU imposed new crypto-related prohibitions which will “contribute to closing potential loopholes”, with an extended prohibition on deposits to crypto-wallets.
