Crypto lifeline: inside Russia’s sanctioned payments workaround
Vladimir Putin rarely lends his name to the opening of a regional bank branch, yet in September he appeared virtually at the launch of a new A7 payments network office in Vladivostok.
A7 is no conventional bank: it is a crypto-linked payments platform jointly owned by sanctioned Moldovan oligarch Ilan Shor and Russia’s sanctioned defence bank Promsvyazbank (PSB).
Putin’s involvement was striking given Moscow’s long-standing suspicion of cryptocurrencies. As recently as early 2022, Russia’s central bank had called for an outright ban on crypto, warning it threatened financial stability and likening it to a pyramid scheme. That stance, reportedly encouraged by the FSB, has since shifted dramatically.
Western sanctions…
