Coinbase, Binance resist calls to kick Russians off crypto platforms

Key Facts

(Reuters)Two of the world's biggest cryptocurrency exchanges, Coinbase Global Inc and Binance, rejected calls on Friday for a blanket ban on all Russian users to stop their platforms from being used as a way round Western sanctions.
By staying put in Russia despite the invasion of Ukraine, the two exchanges are diverging from mainstream finance in a way some anti-money laundering experts and European regulators say weakens Western attempts to isolate Moscow.
"We are not going to unilaterally freeze millions of innocent users' accounts," a spokesperson of Binance, the world's biggest crypto exchange, said in an emailed statement to Reuters.
The price of bitcoin has jumped following the Russian invasion of Ukraine, as people in those countries look to store and move money in anonymous and decentralized crypto.