Japan Adds Garantex to Sanctions List, Freezing Assets and Restricting Transactions

Japan has added Garantex, a Moscow-based cryptocurrency exchange, to its sanctions list, freezing its assets and restricting payments and capital transactions. This move aligns with the US and EU, which have previously targeted Garantex for alleged evasion of international sanctions and facilitation of illicit financial activity.

Garantex has been at the center of a series of enforcement actions, with the US Treasury's Office of Foreign Assets Control (OFAC) sanctioning it in 2022, and the European Union imposing its own sanctions in 2025. In March 2025, an international law enforcement operation seized Garantex's operational infrastructure, including domains and servers located in Germany and Finland, and froze over $26 million in assets.

The designation of Garantex by Japan brings the exchange's total sanctions to three major jurisdictions. Garantex was founded in 2019 and has processed at least $96 billion in transactions since April of that year. The move is part of an expanded round of sanctions against Russia, with Japan introducing service and financing restrictions on 35 vessels linked to Russia's 'shadow fleet.'