Hillary Clinton Sulks Over Binance And Kraken Refusing To Block Russian Users

Hillary Clinton is disappointed that crypto exchanges don't want to block Russian users. (Between)

JAKARTA – Leading cryptocurrency exchanges such as Binance and Kraken have agreed to reject a request by Ukrainian Deputy Prime Minister, Mykhailo Fedorov, to push crypto exchanges to block Russian users. Fedorov himself believes that if the crypto exchange follows his insistence, this step will help Ukraine and weaken Russia.

This rejection was responded to by former US presidential candidate, Hillary Clinton. She criticized crypto exchanges for resisting Fedorov's efforts. Clinton stressed that digital assets should be placed under the government's regulatory framework.

Hillary Clinton expressed her disappointment that several leading crypto exchanges continued to serve Russian users.

“I was disappointed to see that some of the so-called crypto exchanges, not all of them, but some of them refused to end transactions with Russia for some libertarian philosophy or whatever", she said in an interview with MSNBC.

She argued that everyone should "as much as possible" isolate Russia's economic activities. "That pressure will really have an impact on Putin. I think the Treasury, I think the Europeans should see how they can prevent the cryptocurrency market from providing a way out for Russia."

To date, a number of the leading crypto exchanges still serving Russian users are Binance and Kraken. Both exchanges agreed that freezing Russian users' accounts were against the concept of the cryptocurrency industry becoming a symbol of financial freedom for everyone.

This view is by the nature of cryptocurrency itself, which is decentralized, aka not centralized and no single entity can regulate it. Previously, Clinton had expressed her concern about Bitcoin cs which is considered to be able to disrupt the entire country if blockchain-based digital money is adopted. Hence cryptocurrencies must be regulated by the government.

In line with this opinion, European Central Bank President, Christine Lagarde, emphasized that the rules in the crypto world are "very important" for now. Lagarde argues that if cryptocurrencies are not regulated then Russia can use the digital asset to bypass financial penalties.