The Enforcement Directorate Lifts the Freeze on Wazirx's Bank Accounts

The Enforcement Directorate Lifts the Freeze on Wazirx's Bank Accounts

The Enforcement Directorate (ED) of India has lifted the freeze from the bank accounts of cryptocurrency exchange Wazirx, the company has said. The accounts were frozen by the federal agency due to an investigation of 16 fintech companies and instant loan apps.

"Wazirx Says Its Bank Accounts Are Now Unfrozen"

Indian cryptocurrency exchange Wazirx said on Monday that the Enforcement Directorate (ED), the law enforcement and economic intelligence agency of the Government of India, has unfrozen its bank accounts.

The company has explained that the ED is investigating 16 fintech companies and instant loan apps. It has further clarified that Wazirx has "no association with any of the alleged accused fintech and instant loan app companies that appear to be the subject of an ED investigation." The crypto exchange acknowledged that some of the companies "have happened to use the Wazirx platform."

The Indian crypto exchange said that it "has been cooperating with the investigators by providing them with all the necessary details, information, and documents of the alleged accused companies" that used its platform.

"Due to the active cooperation extended by Wazirx and active anti-money laundering (AML) checks that led to the blocking of suspicious accounts, ED has unfrozen the bank accounts of Wazirx," the crypto exchange explained. It further added, "Wazirx is now in a position to continue its banking operations as usual."

The ED announced that it had frozen the bank assets of Wazirx in early August. The agency explained that the action was part of its money laundering investigation into non-bank financial companies (NBFC) and their fintech partners for "predatory lending practices" in violation of the Reserve Bank of India (RBI) guidelines.

Wazirx further clarified on Monday that an in-depth internal investigation has revealed:

"Most of the users whose information was sought by ED were already identified as suspicious by Wazirx internally and were blocked in 2020-2021."

Following Wazirx, the ED froze cryptocurrency and bank assets worth USD 46 million at Vauld, a crypto platform backed by Peter Thiel. In August, the agency also searched the cryptocurrency exchange Coinswitch Kuber. However, the CEO of the exchange said that it was not related to money laundering investigations.