Crypto authorities must report suspected sanctions breaches to UK authorities. Peters & Peters’ Partner Anna Bradshaw told the Guardian the UK’s move was “in line with the more general expansion of financial services and anti-financial crime regulation to the crypto sector”.

“Crypto and virtual assets are treated no differently to any other type of assets for the purposes of an asset freeze,” she said. “Having said that, reliance on crypto or virtual currencies could potentially make it more difficult to detect that a sanctioned party is involved, or that it relates to sanctioned trade or other sanctioned activity – at least in time for steps to be taken to prevent it.”

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