By Laura Sanchez
Investing.com - Russia's invasion of Ukraine continues to intensify, and the West continues to prepare new economic sanctions against Vladimir Putin's country.
According to CNBC, the US may be finalising a new way to increase pressure on Putin: sanctions targeting cryptocurrencies such as Bitcoin and Ethereum.
The US Department of Justice has announced a new task force designed specifically to enforce sanctions. It will focus on Russia's efforts to use cryptocurrencies to evade US sanctions, launder the proceeds of foreign corruption or evade US responses to Russian military aggression.
The concern is that the Kremlin, as well as other ancillary actors supporting the offensive in Ukraine, will circumvent the sanctions regime through digital tokens, which are not owned or issued by a central authority such as a bank.
Bitcoin, like most cryptocurrencies, is decentralised and borderless, meaning that it does not respect national borders. Because there is no central authority to block transactions, digital currencies are also resilient.
Since Russia invaded Ukraine on the 24th of February, statistics from cryptocurrency provider Kaiko show that transactions on centralised bitcoin exchanges in both the Russian rouble and Ukrainian hryvna have reached their highest levels in months, CNBC recalls.