Cryptocurrency exchange BingX openly defies international sanctions, offering its services to Iranian users, confirmed by the exchange’s admin through the popular messaging app Telegram.
Evidently contravening U.S and international laws, BingX has made an Iranian version of its website and exchanges cryptocurrency in the sanctioned Iranian Rial currency. BingX’s execs have communicated in Persian in its official Telegram groups, confirming their compliance with Iranian user registration and acknowledging that national identification card authentication is also possible.
Furthermore, BingX enables swaps of Rial and Tether, a digital currency, which is explicitly prohibited by the United States Department of the Treasury’s Office of Foreign Assets Control (OFAC). Moreover, BingX has been accused of facilitating transactions involving the purchase or sale of sanctioned Rial to the global crypto market.
Amid global criticisms, Iran has been subjected to a plethora of sanctions since 1979 by the U.S. and the United Nations on accusations of violating international law. As a result, Iranian residents generally cannot use centralized cryptocurrency exchanges which poses a considerable risk to any exchange transacting with Iranian currency.
BingX, originated from Lithuania, is permitted to operate in the European Union being a registered financial services company. The exchange is also licensed as a digital currency exchange in Australia and has headquarters in Singapore. However, the firm now seems to be in a precarious position due to openly facilitating transactions with Iranian users despite international sanctions.
Disregarding the prohibitive statutes that Australian and Lithuanian financial institutions are obliged to adhere to, BingX is still continuing to offer its services to Iran-based traders openly on its social channels and official website. Additionally, despite knowing Iran’s status as a country with restrictions, BingX maintains providing services is not synonymous with violating prohibitive statutes and has been openly advertising its Rial exchange services.