Dutch authorities take down 2 crypto exchanges, seize €7 mil. in money laundering bust
The Dutch authorities took down two major cryptocurrency exchanges, pm2btc and Cryptex, and seized 7 million euros worth of cryptocurrency in a money laundering investigation that “ran parallel” to an investigation by the United States Secret Service, FIOD, the Dutch Tax Authority’s investigative department, reported on Friday. According to the American authorities, pm2btc is a Russian exchange connnected with Russian illicit finance. They offered rewards of up to 10 million dollars for information that leads to the arrest of Russian individual Sergey Sergeevich Ivanov, associated with pm2btc.
According to FIOD, the Dutch police investigated Cryptex as part of Operation Endgame, in which they helped take down a large ransomware network. They found that Cryptex, which was using Dutch infrastructure, facilitated many different criminal financial flows, including ransomware.
At the same time, the FIOD investigated pm2btc, a crypto exchange service where users could convert cryptocurrencies into national currencies and vice versa, on the suspicion that criminals used this service, which also used infrastructure in the Netherlands, to launder criminally obtained funds.
The two cryptocurrency exchange services proved to be “closely intertwined,” so the police and FIOD merged their investigations. On Wednesday night, the Dutch authorities raided various locations, taking down servers of pm2btc and Cryptex and seizing cryptocurrency worth 7 million euros. The FIOD did not announce any arrests. The seized servers will be further investigated, the FIOD said.
According to the U.S. Department of the Treasury, pm2btc and associated Ivanov are a “primary money laundering concern” connected with Russian illicit finance. “Treasury, in close coordination with our allies and partners, will continue to use all tools and authorities to disrupt the networks that seek to leverage the virtual assets ecosystem to facilitate their illicit activities,” said Bradley T. Smith, the acting Under Secretary of the Treasury for Terrorism and Financial Intelligence.
The U.S. Department of State issued a reward of up to 10 million dollars for information leading to the arrest and/or conviction of Ivanov, calling him a “Russian money launderer, who has laundered hundreds of millions of dollars’ worth of virtual currency for ransomware actors, initial access brokers, darknet marketplace vendors, and other criminal actors for approximately the last 20 years.”
