Coinbase Cuts Off 25K Russian Wallets

Coinbase has shut down 25K wallets belonging to Russian users due to allegations of "illicit behavior," despite CEO Brian Armstrong's recent plea to the public not to judge the business too harshly for continuing to operate its accounts in Russia. Armstrong has previously stated emphatically in a series of tweets that he would not deny people access to their Coinbase accounts without cause. https://twitter.com/brian_armstrong/status/1499621509651787782?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw%7Ctwcamp%5Etweetembed%7Ctwterm%5E1499621509651787782%7Ctwgr%5E%7Ctwcon%5Es1_&ref_url=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.zerohedge.com%2Fcrypto%2Fcoinbase-ceo-ordinary-russians-are-using-crypto-lifeline https://twitter.com/brian_armstrong/status/1499621804599508993 https://twitter.com/brian_armstrong/status/1499622118224392195 https://twitter.com/brian_armstrong/status/1499622462903914499 https://twitter.com/brian_armstrong/status/1499623019953594369 Now, he appears to be breaking his promise to target a significant number of the company's Russian consumers. Coinbase's profits will be unaffected by this change, which is good news for its investors: Based on data from 2021, the blacklisted addresses account for around 0.2 percent of Coinbase's 11.4 million monthly transactional users. Coinbase's chief legal officer, Paul Grewal, said in a corporate blog post that the largest US crypto exchange had barred access for sanctioned persons. Coinbase, a cryptocurrency trading platform, announced that it had blocked over 25K wallet addresses linked to Russian persons or groups suspected of illegal behavior. Coinbase and Binance CEOs have stated that they will follow government directives to prohibit sanctioned persons, but that they will not remove all Russian users. Some regular Russians are embracing cryptocurrency as a "lifeline now that their currency has collapsed," according to Brian Armstrong, Coinbase's Chief Executive Officer. Major cryptocurrency exchanges such as Coinbase and Binance have stated that they will follow government directives to restrict sanctioned persons, but that they will not block all Russian users. Some regular Russians are embracing cryptocurrency as a "lifeline now that their currency has collapsed," according to Brian Armstrong, Coinbase's Chief Executive Officer. Coinbase CEO Armstrong stated earlier this month that the company would not take action against individual Russians unless sanctions required it. The actual procedure for deciding which accounts may be involved in illegal activity was never made public.