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The largest Russian crypto exchange aggregator, BestChange, has imposed restrictions on the Russian ruble offerings of dozens of coin trading platforms.
The move is in response to complaints about blocked bank cards from users of their services. These have been mounting after Russia took measures to curb financial fraud, which affected crypto trade as well.
BestChange takes down almost a hundred Russian ruble offers
BestChange.ru, the leading exchange aggregation website in the Russian-speaking segment of the crypto market, has delisted trading pairs with the Russian ruble offered by 95 crypto exchange providers.
The platform’s decision was prompted by numerous complaints and signs of a scheme known as “white triangle,” Russian crypto media reported.
The latter involves an exchange office acting as an intermediary connecting a seller and a buyer of cryptocurrency, who transfer the funds directly between each other.
The total is often split into smaller amounts and sent from different accounts, which means the money might have been used in dubious transactions, Nikita Zuborev, senior analyst at BestChange, explained to the Russian business news outlet RBC. Speaking for its crypto page, he elaborated:
“Over the past few months, we’ve seen an increase in user complaints about unstable payouts to bank cards and risks associated with transfers from unverified sources, which arose after trades at a number of exchange offices.”
On Oct. 15, BestChange started restricting featured exchange services showing “signs of low-quality ruble traffic,” Zuborev revealed.
The signs included payments through unverified processors and peer-to-peer (P2P) platforms, inflated rates relative to the average exchange rate, multiple small payments for a single request, confirmed complaints about split transfers, and temporary card blockings or return requests from senders.
“Of course, as a result of the new rules, rates that seemed unnaturally favorable were going to disappear from the listings,” the BestChange representative highlighted.
Other experts interviewed by RBC last month warned that the better the price of the exchanged cryptocurrency seems, the greater the likelihood that dirty money was involved.
While the aggregator admitted to having no hard evidence that any of the blacklisted exchangers were involved in illegal activities, it took the temporary step to protect users, Zuborev noted.
He also emphasized, the measures apply only to Russian ruble transactions, with those denominated in other currencies remaining unaffected.
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BestChange.ru is Russia’s most popular crypto exchange aggregator.
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Russia adopted a series of legislative changes, presumably to fight various types of financial fraud, including on the Internet, and deal with widespread criminal phenomena such as money muling, colloquially called “dropping” in Russian.
Some of the measures, such as the blocking of bank accounts in case of suspicious transactions and limiting cash withdrawals at ATMs, have been interpreted as also targeting crypto traders and clamping down on crypto-related transactions, particularly those on a P2P basis.
Risks are rising for P2P crypto traders in Russia
Commenting for Forklog, a leading Russian-language source for cryptocurrency news, Nikita Zuborev predicted increased risks for users of P2P exchange services.
He said he expects players processing illicit money to migrate to such platforms, increasing the likelihood of dealing with “unscrupulous” traders, and also noted:
“Users who don’t care about the integrity of their funds will likely receive more favorable exchange rates than before.”
Zuborev also pointed out that anti-money laundering (AML) practices for fiat transactions in this market are virtually nonexistent due to their complexity.
He believes know-your-customer (KYC) and know-your-transaction (KYT) procedures, as implemented by established cryptocurrency exchanges, are the most effective preventive measures.
BestChange has had its share of troubles with Russian authorities over the past few years. The aggregator has been taken offline on multiple occasions for disseminating crypto trading information.
Access to its website was last restricted in April of this year, after the Federal Service for Supervision of Communications, Information Technology and Mass Media, Russia’s telecom watchdog, also known as Roskomnadzor, added its domain to a registry of prohibited internet sources. The restrictions were lifted in August, as reported by Cryptopolitan.
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