MEXC gets off the U.S. money train as Treasury targets alleged $16B laundering pipeline 🚂

The U.S. Treasury Department has ordered cryptocurrency exchange MEXC Global to be cut off from the American financial system, accusing it of facilitating at least $16 billion in transactions linked to illicit activity, sanctions evasion and cybercrime. The action bars U.S. financial institutions from processing funds transfers to or from MEXC once the order takes effect 30 days after publication in the Federal Register.

Issued through the Financial Crimes Enforcement Network on Friday as part of Operation Economic Outcast, the order alleges that MEXC processed transactions involving sanctioned groups in Iran, Russia and North Korea between May 2021 and May 2026. FinCEN said those flows included around $1.5 billion linked to Russian sanctions evasion and $232 million in direct transactions with sanctioned entities. The agency also identified roughly $200 million linked to the A7A5 stablecoin and about $22 million benefiting Iran’s central bank and its Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps.

“Financial institutions cannot have it both ways: Either you support the Iranian regime, or you have access to the U.S. financial system,” Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent said. “Treasury will continue to sever the Iranian regime’s economic lifelines and thwart its desperate attempts to circumvent U.S. sanctions using digital assets.”

FinCEN named MEXC a “primary money laundering concern” in connection with Russian illicit finance and said the exchange continued transacting with sanctioned Russian exchange Garantex and its successor Grinex as recently as June 2026. The agency also cited severe deficiencies in MEXC’s compliance controls, despite the exchange’s public claims that it maintains anti-money-laundering measures and bars users in places such as Iran and North Korea.

Founded in 2018, MEXC is one of the world’s 20 largest crypto exchanges. FinCEN said it processes more than $1 billion in daily transactions, holds around $5 billion in reserves and offers more than 3,000 tokens, while DefiLlama reported about $4.48 billion in total assets on Friday. MEXC did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

Treasury’s wider campaign has previously designated Russia’s A7 Network a transnational criminal organization and proposed cutting off its front companies from U.S. finance, flagging more than $179 billion in transactions through its ruble-backed A7A5 token, much of it routed through Garantex and Grinex. The U.S. Treasury has also given itself power to sanction foreign persons operating in or providing services to Iran’s digital asset sector, part of a campaign Bessent dubbed Economic D-Day.