The CEO of Romania’s largest crypto exchange Coinflux was reportedly arrested on a warrant from the United States for fraud, organized crime, and money laundering, local news outlet Mediafax reported Dec. 13. Coinflux has subsequently stopped all digital currency exchanges.
Founded in 2015 in the Romanian city of Cluj, Coinflux is an online digital currency trading platform, with reportedly more than 200 million euro worth of Bitcoin (BTC), Ethereum (ETH), Litecoin (LTC), and Ripple (XRP) in transactions.
Vlad Nistor, the CEO and founder of Coinflux, was supposedly arrested on the territory of Romania upon the request of U.S. prosecutors. Nistor is accused of alleged fraudulent activity, organized crime and money laundering. The issue of extradition of Nistor to the U.S. will reportedly be heard by the Appeals Court of Bucharest.
Following the purported arrest, Coinflux published an announcement saying that the exchange has temporarily suspended all digital currency exchanges, while the company’s bank accounts have been frozen. Coinflux states that the ongoing investigation has also restricted its access to some parts of the platform.
In July of 2018, the Ministry of Finance of Romania released a draft Emergency Ordinance, which regulates the issuance of electronic money (e-money). Per the document, any legal entity looking to issue e-money must have a share capital of no less than €350,000 ($395,000), while its members are subject of approval by the Romanian National Bank (BNR).
While the first Bitcoin automated teller machine (ATM) in the country appeared back in 2014, it took Romanian authorities about three years to come up with an expanded comment on cryptocurrencies. In 2017, Ilan Laufer, Romania’s Business, Commerce and Entrepreneurship Environment Minister, expressed his belief in cryptocurrencies, but pinpointed that the area should be officially regulated.