According to the Financial Times, the Swiss federal government plans to freeze crypto assets owned by Russians and enterprises located inside Switzerland’s borders. Following the war on Ukraine, Russia has already been subjected to sanctions, and the freeze will be an additional hardship for the nation.
According to sources in the Financial Times, Swiss Finance Minister Guy Parmelin claims that Switzerland has blocked the assets and bank accounts of 223 Russians, including close aides to President Vladimir Putin. An additional punishment for violating EU sanctions would be the restriction of cryptocurrencies. As reported by the Financial Times, a top official in the Swiss finance ministry said that freezing the crypto assets was critical in maintaining Switzerland’s blockchain integrity.
It is estimated that Switzerland and its neighboring principality Liechtenstein have roughly 1,128 blockchain enterprises. The European Union said on Wednesday that it will tighten down on Russian attempts to circumvent economic sanctions via the use of cryptocurrency. France’s Finance Minister, Bruno Le Maire, has said that France is taking all feasible efforts to ensure that cryptocurrencies cannot be used to dodge EU financial penalties.
Popular cryptocurrency exchanges like Binance and Coinbase are under pressure to restrict and freeze Russian users’ access to their platforms. This shows that cryptocurrencies are really cross-border. You should be aware that an exchange may be frozen or restricted in some way. Self-custodial wallets and cold storage are significantly more difficult to confiscate than crypto held through regulated channels, such as a bank account.
Furthermore, he said that if a person carries their crypto key around with them at all times, it would be tough to track them down. But if they utilize crypto services like exchanges and money, these service points might be targeted by criminals.