- The topic of discussion in recent weeks in the political and financial circles of the United States has been cleared by both officials.
- IMF director Georgieva Kristalina believes that so far there is no solid evidence to the contrary.
- While the US Treasury Secretary, Janet Yellen, believes that it is very difficult to evade Western sanctions imposed on Russia.
The managing director of the International Monetary Fund, Georgieva Kristalina, considers that there is no strong evidence on the use of cryptocurrencies by governments, companies or individuals to massively evade international sanctions.
The official agreed with the Secretary of the Treasury of the United States, Janet Yellen, on the impossibility of using digital money on a large scale to try to circumvent the sanctions imposed by the West on Russia for the invasion of Ukraine.
“There is no strong evidence that digital money can be used to circumvent sanctions. Why? Because the financial system still has an important role to play,” Georgieva said this week during a virtual conference between the IMF and the World Bank. The director of the international credit organization specified that “The sanctions very clearly prevent the transactions.” However, she clarified that the IMF is closely following the case and is monitoring compliance with Western sanctions on Russia, since the war began on February 24.
Ukraine has received help in cryptocurrencies
She noted that the Ukrainian authorities “were very interested in digital currencies before the war. So they did a lot of work." This allowed them to receive help “at a low cost, quickly”, reaching the people who need it, added Georgieva. However, she said that the aid in cryptocurrencies (about US $100 million) represents only a small part of all the contributions of the Western countries to support the attacked country.
In her remarks, Georgieva also mentioned that Russia is “moving towards a digital central bank currency” or CBDC. As are China, the European Union, and the United States.
On The Flipside
- The alleged use of cryptocurrencies to evade sanctions has been a recurring topic of discussion in recent weeks.
- US politicians and financial analysts have been wondering if the Kremlin has actually been able to get around Western sanctions by using digital money.
US Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen is skeptical on this point. "It's not that that sector is completely one where things can be evaded," she said in early March.
A month later, during a hearing of the House Financial Services Committee, he noted that although "it is a channel we're worried about, we haven't seen significant evasion through crypto so far."
