Crypto could bypass President Biden's 'devastating' sanctions on Russian banks and elites: Report

cointelegraph.com:

The sanctions announced by United States President Joe Biden in response to Russia’s attack on Ukraine did not include cutting the country off from payments on the SWIFT system or cryptocurrency transfers.

In a Thursday announcement from the White House, Biden said the U.S. and its allies and partners would be enforcing sanctions aimed at imposing “devastating costs” on Russia due to “Putin’s war of choice against Ukraine.” The U.S. president announced that the country would sever its financial system from Russia's largest bank, Sberbank, as well as impose “full blocking sanctions” on VTB Bank, Bank Otkritie, Sovcombank OJSC, Novikombank, and their subsidiaries. Biden also named several elite nationals who have “enriched themselves at the expense of the Russian state” as part of the penalties levied against Russia.

However, speaking to reporters on Thursday, Biden announced that the economic measures would not extend to cutting Russia off from the SWIFT network — a payments system used across the world — in response to European officials. Leaving this option available to Russians and seemingly being unable to block cryptocurrency transfers could reportedly mitigate the impact of any sanctions levied by the United States and its allies. 

According to a Thursday report from Bloomberg, Russian billionaires could potentially circumvent any U.S. sanctions by using crypto to buy goods and services and continue to make investments outside countries experiencing harsher economic impacts due to the invasion. Individuals in Iran were able to solicit crypto donations for flood victims in 2019 — while under U.S. sanctions — and Venezuela President Nicolás Maduro proposed a bill in 2020 aiming to use crypto to evade different sanctions