US Sanctioned, Venezuelan Oil Company Wants to Be Paid Using Crypto

Previously, Venezuela's Attorney General, Tarek William Saab, on April 9 announced a second wave of arrests related to an embezzlement scheme, involving oil sales paid for in cash and cryptocurrency, and other money laundering using different methods.

Launching Bitcoin.com, Saturday (13/4/2024) the alleged scheme was carried out jointly by the former head of Venezuela's state-owned oil company PDVSA, Tareck El Aissami, and former head of cryptocurrency watchdog Sunacrip Joselit Ramirez.

Both are suspected of being involved in the assignment and liquidation of unspecified amounts of crude oil using digital transactions and cash.

Saab cited an informant who revealed that El Aissami and Ramirez used the imposition of sanctions against the Venezuelan government as a pretext to circumvent standard procedures.

The informants stated that, once, USD 35 million worth of money was received in a company's bank account, and then part of this money was converted into crypto assets.

Although Saab did not share figures related to these allegations, previous reports indicated that the loss figure reached around USD 20 billion or the equivalent of Rp. 322.4 trillion, due to unregistered sales which were then laundered using cryptocurrency purchases and other methods.

The involvement of cryptocurrency assets, according to Saab, is one of the factors that makes this case difficult to investigate.

“These people use the most modern financial system, namely digital currency. Digital financial technology is used to cover up and avoid responsibility,” he explained.