At a conference on Wednesday, U.S. officials said that Bitzlato Ltd. had been charged with money laundering, and the company’s founder had been detained in Miami.
According to Deputy Attorney General Lisa Monaco, Bitzlato had been effectively shut down, and its creator Anatoly Legkodymov had been under U.S. custody. The enforcement steps were coordinated with the FBI, French authorities, and the U.S. Treasury Department.
A primary money-laundering concern from the Treasury’s Financial Crimes Enforcement Network (FinCEN) is among the most severe sanctions in the government’s armoury against criminals since it typically results in the corporation being cut off from the global financial system.
This makes the market a worldwide pariah, as Wally Adeyemo, the deputy secretary of the Treasury, described it.
Legkodymov, a Russian national currently residing in China, is Bitzlato’s principal owner. His arraignment in the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of Florida after his arrest on Wednesday.
After several years of operation, the exchange offered peer-to-peer services and housed the wallets of criminals buying and selling unlawful commodities, according to the Justice Department. The FinCEN claimed that the corporation played a significant role in processing illegal transactions for Russian operators, including individuals with ties to the Russian government.
According to Monaco, the investigation and subsequent raid against Bitzlato was the most severe U.S. action against a criminal crypto network.
The company’s servers were confiscated because it was suspected of having regular business dealings with the Russian-based darknet market Hydra Market. The “Hydra-Bitzlato crypto-crime axis” has been broken apart, as stated by Monaco.
