Exclusive: Binance served crypto traders in Iran for years despite U.S. sanctions

Monday, July 11, 2022

by Linda Noakes

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Here's what you need to know.

Europe is on edge as the Nord Stream Russian gas link enters shutdown, Biden weighs his authority to declare an abortion-related public health emergency, and Twitter shares slide after the Musk deal falls apart

Today's biggest stories

Asal Alizade, an Iranian trader on Binance, displays the mobile application on her smart phone in Dubai, United Arab Emirates, July 4, 2022. REUTERS/Amr Alfiky

BUSINESS & MARKETS

The world's largest crypto exchange, Binance, continued to process trades by clients in Iran despite U.S. sanctions and a company ban on doing business there, a Reuters investigation has found. Iranian traders said they continued to use their Binance accounts until September of last year, only losing access after the exchange tightened its anti-money laundering checks a month earlier.

Shares in Twitter fell about 6% in premarket trading as a legal tussle between Elon Musk and the social media company is expected to take center stage after the world's richest person walked away from the $44 billion deal. Here's why Twitter has the legal edge in its deal dispute with Musk.

The biggest single pipeline carrying Russian gas to Germany started annual maintenance, with flows expected to stop for 10 days, but governments, markets and companies are worried the shutdown might be extended due to the war in Ukraine. So what are Europe's energy alternatives if Russian gas flows stop?

If shipping is the beating heart of global trade, its pulse is about to get slower. Faced with uncertainty about which fuels to use in the long term to cut greenhouse gas emissions, many shipping firms are sticking with aging fleets, but older vessels may soon have to start sailing slower to comply with new environmental rules.

Europe's Airbus has revised up its forecast for jet deliveries over the next 20 years as soaring fuel bills prompt airlines to seek new, more fuel-efficient planes.

The bond market is pricing in a sharp deceleration in inflation over the next year, as aggressive tightening by the Federal Reserve to counter the steepest surge in prices in a generation ramps up recession concerns. The deceleration, which economists also call disinflation, is characterized by a slowing of the rise of overall prices and likely would be a welcome respite for financial markets.

Firefighters remove debris after a military strike hit a building in Kharkiv, Ukraine, July 11, 2022. REUTERS/Nacho Doce

WORLD

Russian weapons pounding Ukraine's second largest city Kharkiv killed at least three people, authorities said, while rescuers pulled survivors from the rubble of an earlier strike on an apartment block that killed 19 people in another city. Here's what you need to know about the conflict right now.

Sri Lanka's President Gotabaya Rajapaksa and the entire cabinet will resign to make way for a unity government, the prime minister's office said, after tens of thousands of protesters stormed the official residences of both men.

With flags at half-mast, Japan mourned the killing of former premier Shinzo Abe even as the ruling party that he had dominated secured an election win that gives current Prime Minister Fumio Kishida the chance to cement his own power. The mother of the man arrested for Abe's killing is a member of the Unification Church, the head of its Japanese arm said.

Tensions between China and the United States, and the withdrawal of the remote Pacific island nation of Kiribati, have overshadowed the Pacific Islands Forum as leaders arrived in Fiji for the first in-person summit in three years. China has warned Asian nations to avoid being used as 'chess pieces' by big powers.

British Foreign Secretary Liz Truss entered the race to replace Boris Johnson as prime minister, taking the number of candidates in an increasingly bitter and unpredictable contest to 11. Here's who might succeed Johnson.

President Joe Biden talks to the media as he takes a bike ride at Gordons Pond in Rehoboth, Delaware, July 10, 2022. REUTERS/Tasos Katopodis

U.S.

U.S. President Joe Biden said he has asked his administration to consider whether he has authority to declare an abortion-related public health emergency after the Supreme Court overturned the Roe v. Wade decision that legalized abortion nationwide. We spoke to students re-thinking their plans to go to colleges in states with abortion bans.

Biden will host an event at the White House today to tout the first major federal gun safety bill in three decades, which he signed into law in June.

Donald Trump's former close adviser Steve Bannon has told the congressional panel investigating the attack on the Capitol that he is ready to testify, a change of heart days before he is due to be tried for contempt of Congress. Links between Trump associates and militants will be in focus at hearings this week.

Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer, the most senior Democrat in the chamber, has tested positive for the coronavirus and has very mild symptoms, a spokesperson said.

The operator of Texas's power grid called on state residents for the second time this year to conserve energy, warning of potential rolling blackouts amid predictions for record-high temperatures.

A wildfire threatening some of the world's oldest giant sequoia trees in California's Yosemite National Park expanded five-fold over the weekend as smoke prompted air quality alerts throughout the park and obscured views of its famed scenery.

BREAKINGVIEWS

Agenda-setting financial insight from the international commentary brand of Reuters

Read Gina Chon and Lauren Silva Laughlin on how Elon Musk lit a fire Twitter didn’t know it needed, Una Galani on how a raging crisis puts Sri Lanka’s creditors on the spot, and Pete Sweeney on the repercussions of Shinzo Abe’s assassination