MAS stands for Monetary Exchange of Singapore, the central bank, and the significant financial management body of the country. It has addressed the country’s cryptocurrency exchanges to follow all the norms against Russia. MAS gave this statement after the research disclosed that several million had been garnered in the form of donations by pro-Russia groups. The donation was made for the most known cause, the conflict between Ukraine and Russia. Several other financial authorities have enforced strict norms against Russia and its transactional activities.
Singapore’s government’s proclamation of this decision strengthens the country’s alignment with the EU’s views. On the other hand, European Union also implemented several restrictions against Russia at the start of this year. The earlier restrictions constricted the Russia-EU crypto payments only to a limit of $10,000.
But after that, in early October, several other more stringent restrictions came in the way of Russia-EU crypto transactions. This included banning all crypto-asset wallets, services, accounts, etc., without considering the amount present in the wallet. During the same period, MAS also made its guidelines to restrict any transactional flow toward Russia. Their measures targeted Russian bands and other financial bodies in the country. Furthermore, all kinds of fundraising activities were also banned, which can be aimed at profiting the Russian government.
However, crypto exchanges were concerned with aligning these measures. That’s why MAS sanctioned separate addresses for them. For example, Kraken, one of the country’s famous crypto exchanges, banned all Russian users’ accounts. In addition, they confiscated all the accounts related to Russia. Along the same line, Dapper Labs also blocked all the accounts associated with Russia. This stopped Russian users from making any crypto transaction or NFT trade. This also included a restriction on fund withdrawal.
Binance also mentioned that they are trying to follow the EU measures while keeping their users in mind. During this course, some Russian natives are shifting to other countries like Kazakhstan to use the services like before.
