Following the freezing of $27 million USDT by Tether on the sanctioned exchange Garantex, the platform halted all trading and withdrawals. Garantex stated that its wallets, holding 2.5 billion rubles, are frozen, leading to the temporary suspension of all services. This action came after the European Union targeted Garantex on February 26 as part of its sixteenth round of sanctions against Russia. This marks the first time a Russian-based digital currency exchange is directly under EU sanctions. The U.S. Treasury Department had also imposed sanctions on Garantex in 2022. Russian authorities see this as continuous pressure from the West on the crypto market but acknowledge that it cannot completely block Russia’s access to digital currency markets. Sergey Mendeleev, the founder of Garantex, emphasized the significance of self-sufficiency in this event. Garantex, founded in 2019 and initially registered in Estonia, has seen its daily trading volume grow from $11 million in 2022 to over $121.6 million in 2025, showing a 1000% increase. However, this volume is still incomparable to major exchanges like Binance, which trades $23 billion daily. These developments underscore the wide-ranging implications of sanctions and restrictions in the crypto market, but complete removal of Russia from this space still seems unlikely.
