U.S. Plan: 1) Impose Sanctions 2) ??? 3) Hackers Get $100 Million and Move to a Bigger Office
While you’re reading this, Grinex is conducting deals worth billions of dollars.
While you’re reading this, Grinex is conducting deals worth billions of dollars.
U.S. authorities have once again imposed sanctions against the cryptocurrency exchange Garantex, accusing it of facilitating the laundering of over $100 million in illicit proceeds and supporting the operations of ransomware groups. Founded in 2019, the exchange had already been sanctioned by the U.S. Treasury in 2022 but continued to operate, and after a law enforcement crackdown in March, moved clients and assets to a new platform called Grinex. Along with Garantex, the sanctions list now includes Grinex, six affiliated companies, and three top executives — including co-founder and chief commercial officer Alexander “Mira” Serda, who is currently wanted.
Investigators claim that Garantex became a key node in the ransomware ecosystem, handling transactions linked to Conti, Black Basta, Ryuk, LockBit, NetWalker, and Phoenix Cryptolocker. The platform processed millions of dollars obtained through cybercriminal activity and darknet market trading. After the March shutdown, users who lost access to their funds were offered compensation in the form of A7A5 tokens, backed by fiat currency and issued by the Kyrgyz company Old Vector, which has also been sanctioned.
According to the U.S. Department of Justice, the exchange’s executives knew the funds were of criminal origin and attempted to hide this from law enforcement. Alexey Beschyokov and Mira Serda are accused of managing Garantex from its founding until 2025. The former was detained in India, while the latter remains at large. The U.S. State Department has offered a $5 million reward for information leading to Serda’s arrest, and $1 million for information on other key figures in the project.
Despite the 2022 sanctions, Garantex continued servicing U.S. companies, using a method of daily cryptocurrency wallet rotation, which made blocking transactions on U.S. exchanges more difficult. Europol confirmed that it assisted in the March operation to seize Garantex’s servers and block its websites. According to U.S. authorities, Grinex — as the successor — has already conducted operations worth billions of dollars, and its network of affiliated companies allowed the exchange to effectively circumvent restrictions.
