U.S. Senator Richard Blumenthal announced a formal Senate investigation into Binance after recent reports revealed that the world’s largest cryptocurrency exchange allegedly facilitated nearly $1.7 billion in transactions linked to sanctioned Iranian entities and the so-called “ghost fleet” of Russian tankers.
Blumenthal demands answers from Binance
The investigation focuses on questions regarding the company’s compliance practices and its response to internal warnings from compliance staff.
In a letter to Binance CEO Richard Teng, Blumenthal, ranking member of the Senate Permanent Subcommittee on Investigations, demanded documents and records detailing the circumstances surrounding the illicit transfers and why compliance staff who discovered the activity would have been suspended or fired.
Interestingly, the investigation comes as Binance recently said it had significantly reduced its exposure to sanctioned entities, reporting an approximately 96% decline in related activity between early 2024 and mid-2025. The exchange argued that sanctions-related transactions now represent only a tiny fraction of total trading volume.
According to reports in the New York Times and the Wall Street Journal, internal Binance investigators found more than 1,500 accounts accessible from Iran and traced funds sent by intermediaries including Hexa Whale and Blessed Trust to entities linked to Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps and payments to sanctions-evading Russian ship personnel.
“Binance is a repeat offender: it has long known that the Iranian regime and its terrorist proxies use its cryptocurrency platform as a convenient and reliable means to circumvent international sanctions, anti-money laundering controls and other banking restrictions,” the senator wrote in the letter.
Blumenthal’s letter also accused Binance of ignoring clear warning signs, allowing potentially illicit accounts to operate, and even apparently providing support to money laundering entities, despite a 2023 agreement with US authorities that required enhanced anti-money laundering controls.
The senator’s investigation also references concerns about the firing of internal investigators who reported the activity, raising questions about the company’s compliance culture.
Binance has publicly denied knowingly facilitating sanctions evasion or that its compliance staff were punished for raising concerns, saying the reported accounts had been banned and that it was cooperating with regulators.