Binance Bans Russians From Buying USD, Euro From P2P Service Following New EU Sanctions

Binance will no longer allow Russians to buy and sell dollars and euros directly from other users via its peer-to-peer, or P2P, service.

The restriction will also apply to individuals residing in Russia regardless of their citizenship, Russian news outlet RBC reported, citing a representative of the cryptocurrency exchange.

Meanwhile, citizens of European Union member countries are barred from carrying out P2P transactions that use the Russian ruble.

Binance, which claims to be the largest cryptocurrency exchange in the world in terms of trade volume, described its P2P trading service as "the direct trading of users with each other without the participation of the exchange as an intermediary."

The company's decision was made in accordance with the EU's 10th package of sanctions that were imposed on Russia late last month over the country's ongoing invasion of Ukraine, the representative told RBC.

The sanctions targeted 121 individuals and entities "who are instrumental in the continuation of this brutal war, including those responsible for military activities, for political decisions, who are polluting the public space with disinformation and malicious narratives, adding to the military warfare also through information warfare," according to EU foreign policy chief Josep Borrell.

Binance users affected by the new restrictions are reportedly greeted with the message, "select a local currency, in accordance with the Binance rules for the country specified during verification," when they try to make transactions in dollars or euros.

"To continue using Binance P2P, users can select other available fiat currencies," a Binance spokesperson said, according to RBC.

Binance restricted access for users in Russia whose assets exceeded €10,000 ($10,585) in value last year.

Despite this, the exchange and its P2P service are still reportedly popular with Russians.

An estimated 14.6 million Russians, or around 10% of the total population, own cryptocurrency, according to Singapore-based exchange TripleA.

Russians began to actively use the P2P services of cryptocurrency exchanges after both Visa and Mastercard suspended operations in Russia in March last year.

This was also followed by the exclusion of several Russian banks from the widely-used SWIFT financial transaction processing system.

Among those removed from SWIFT was the Russian majority state-owned Sberbank, which is the largest bank in Russia in terms of assets owned, according to Statista.