According to an Elliptic report, Bitpapa, ABCeX, Exmo, Rapira and Aifory Pro would be facilitating ruble-to-crypto conversions for sanctioned entities.
Blockchain analytics firm Elliptic published a report on Saturday identifying five cryptocurrency exchanges — Bitpapa, ABCeX, Exmo, Rapira and Aifory Pro — that are allegedly helping Russian entities evade international sanctions, filling the void left by the shutdown of Russian exchange Garantex, whose website was taken down by authorities in March 2025 after being heavily sanctioned in mid-2022.
According to Elliptic, these exchanges enable the conversion of Russian rubles into cryptocurrencies, which can then be transferred across borders “without going through any intermediary” and converted into another fiat currency. “Despite increasing regulatory pressure, many of these exchanges, some with nominal registrations outside Russia, continue to facilitate high volumes of crypto asset trading linked to sanctioned entities,” the report reads.
Among the exchanges analyzed, Bitpapa is the only one already formally sanctioned: the U.S. Treasury’s OFAC (Office of Foreign Assets Control) designated it in March 2024 for supporting sanctions evasion. Elliptic found that approximately 9.7% of crypto funds leaving Bitpapa are destined for OFAC-sanctioned entities, and that the exchange “manages its wallets specifically to evade sanctions enforcement, constantly rotating addresses.” ABCeX, meanwhile, reportedly operates from an office in Moscow’s Federation Tower — the same location as Garantex — and is said to have processed at least $11 billion in crypto, with “significant amounts” sent to Garantex and Aifory Pro.
The most significant case flagged by Elliptic involves Exmo: despite the exchange having claimed to have exited Russia following the invasion of Ukraine, transferring its business to Exmo.me, Elliptic states that Exmo.com and Exmo.me “continue to share the same custodial wallet infrastructure,” allowing the commingling of funds between the platform serving the Russian market and the one serving Western markets. The two entities are said to have conducted over $19.5 million in direct transactions with sanctioned entities. Rapira, an exchange headquartered in Georgia but with an office in Moscow, allegedly carried out over $72 million in direct transactions with Grinex, the sanctioned successor to Garantex.
The final exchange in the report, Aifory Pro, operates across Moscow, Dubai and Türkiye and “explicitly facilitates the circumvention of service restrictions” by offering virtual USDt (USDT) payment cards to access foreign services blocked in Russia. The context is made even more significant by data published by Chainalysis last month: sanctions are said to have driven the total value of cryptocurrencies received by illicit addresses in 2025 to $154 billion — the highest level ever recorded — due to “unprecedented volumes associated with nation-states.”
