HTX, one of the crypto exchanges sanctioned by the United Kingdom, has allegedly moved more than $21 billion in illicit funds. In May, the UK Government sanctioned a list of entities, including HTX, on suspicion of handling illicit Russian funds and using crypto assets to obscure origins and launder money.
The government banned UK citizens from interacting with the sanctioned entities, while the firms and exchanges cannot establish connections to UK banking entities. The UK sanctioned long-running entities like the Exmo Exchange, as well as several companies and individuals, in connection with evading sanctions. According to the report, HTX (formerly Huobi Global), one of the key entities in the sanctioned list, had a flow analysis that showed the exchange moved over $21.06B connected to various attempts at illicit finance.
Sanctioned HTX moves $21B worth of illicit funds
According to the flow analysis, the funds were moved between May 2021 and May 2026. On-chain analysis uncovered HTX activities spanning beyond the UK’s scope of tracking Russian capital in the crypto space. As Cryptopolitan reported, HTX has been targeted by UK regulators for unlawful asset promotion. According to data from Global Ledger shared with Cryptopolitan, HTX was a hub for risky transfers of BTC, ETH, and USDT on the TRON network.
The Russian capitals were moved through other intermediary high-risk entities, including Garantex, Grinex, A7A5, and darknet markets. HTX was the hub for inflows and outflows from other entities as well. HTX also interacted with older laundering venues like Huione Group, Nobitex, and other threat actors. Huione Group moved $4.41B, becoming the second most active entity to use HTX.
HTX still processes $1.1B in daily volumes and remains one of the top centralized exchanges. The market, linked to Justin Sun, is also one of the key venues to process USDT on the TRON network and gain liquidity from the TRON ecosystem. The spotlight on HTX came from Russia’s well-established pathways of crypto laundering. The Grinex exchange was one of the major laundering markets, at least until it froze all trading following a hack in April.
Grinex held $16.54B worth of USDT and A7A5 between March 2025 and April 2026. The sanctions evasion network is also linked to the Russian state bank Promsvyazbank and oligarch Ilan Shor. The Garantex exchange was also used in the past five years, laundering $14.52B in ETH, USDT, and USDC just for 2024. Garantex and Grinex were excluded and isolated from the crypto CEX network, and lost some of their volumes. Despite this, the exchanges continued working against the sanctions and still processed funds.
