Covered Institutions

The United States has warned it could impose sanctions on Algeria over reports the North African country is moving ahead with a purchase of Russia’s Sukhoi Su-57E stealth fighter jets.

A top Democratic lawmaker has opened a congressional probe into the $500-million investment deal between representatives of Abu Dhabi’s “spy sheik” and the Trump family’s crypto firm World Liberty Financial, The Wall Street Journal reported.

Crypto companies are pitching new concessions to banks in an effort to keep a sweeping digital-asset market-structure bill moving in the Senate, with proposals that would give community banks a larger role in the stablecoin ecosystem.

Uzbekistan’s state-owned mining giant Almalyk Mining-Metallurgical Complex (AMMC) has awarded more than $200 million in procurement tenders to 10 foreign firms whose ownership and business activity are murky, including companies that reported themselves as “dormant” or “inactive,” OCCRP reported. 

The European Union’s new Anti-Money Laundering Authority said it is on track to become fully operational in 2028, setting out a multi-year plan that flags emerging illicit-finance threats ranging from crypto-assets to “novel payment channels.”

A Spanish police corruption investigation has widened into a narcotics and money-laundering scandal that links a senior economic-crimes investigator and a son of the Duke of Seville to an international drug-trafficking ring, The Times reported. 

Convicted sex offender Jeffrey Epstein made an early investment into Coinbase Global Inc. in 2014, putting roughly $3 million into the crypto exchange, according to emails released by the U.S. Department of Justice and reviewed by Decrypt.

The Trump administration is preparing to issue a broad Treasury Department license as soon as this week that would allow companies to pump oil in Venezuela, a move aimed at easing U.S. sanctions and jump-starting investment in the country’s decaying energy infrastructure. 

U.S. investigators are examining whether specific cryptocurrency platforms have helped Iranian officials and state-linked actors evade sanctions as crypto activity in Iran surges, a blockchain researcher with direct knowledge of Treasury’s concerns told Reuters.

A U.S. senator said late Monday that an ongoing investigation into Credit Suisse’s historical ties to Nazi Germany has identified “hundreds” of accounts with potential links to Nazi-era officials and industrialists, including fresh evidence of the bank’s relationship with the SS, Bloomberg reported.