OKX faces multi-million fine from the Netherlands' central bank

Global spot crypto trading platform OKX has been fined €2.25 million ($2.6 million) by the Dutch National Bank (DNB) for operating in the Netherlands without mandatory registration. 

According to a Wednesday press release by the Dutch central bank, OKX is being fined for its services between July 2023 and August 2024. At the time, the exchange was officially known as Aux Cayes Fintech Co., and offered crypto services in the Netherlands without registering with local financial watchdogs.

To connect the digital asset market with the country’s anti-money laundering (AML) regulations, the Dutch government mandated registration for the industry in 2020.

Several exchanges have faced sanctions for similar violations, including Crypto.com, which was fined €2.85 million, and Kraken was ordered to pay €4 million for failing to meet the same requirements.

“This fine relates to a legacy registration matter that has long since been remediated, with no impact on customers,” an OKX spokesperson said by email. 

OKX pays fines in 2025 for operational violations

The 2017-founded trading platform told reporters the penalty was the smallest ever imposed by the DNB against a major trading platform. Per a company spokesperson, the fines had been reduced because it took corrective measures that included migrating Dutch users to its fully Markets in Crypto Assets (MiCA)-licensed European entity.

However, this is the third instance of rule-breaking-related penalties OKX has found itself entangled in this year. In February, the platform’s Seychelles entity was ordered to pay a $504 million penalty in the United States after authorities identified several compliance violations. 

Investigators said that between 2018 and early 2024, OKX processed more than $1 trillion in transactions for US customers, despite officially blocking them from its platform. These included more than $5 billion in trades linked to criminal proceeds and suspicious activity.

A compliance audit in 2023 uncovered systemic flaws, leading to a sanction of €1.1 million ($1.2 million) in April from the Financial Intelligence Analysis Unit (FIAU). According to the FIAU, some of these failures were “serious and systematic.”

OKX responded by promising financial watchdogs it would improve its compliance in the coming years. 

During the same month, Thailand’s Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) filed a criminal complaint against the trading platform alongside nine individuals with the country’s Economic Crime Suppression Division. The SEC alleged that the group ran a digital asset exchange in breach of the Emergency Decree on Digital Asset Businesses enacted in 2018.

In January, the Malta Financial Services Authority (MFSA) imposed a €304,000 penalty on OKX for failing to comply with certain unspecified regulations. In an agreement made during that enforcement, the exchange agreed to appoint an independent third-party service provider to review its governance framework.

Beyond fines, Bloomberg News reported in March that European authorities were investigating whether hackers had used the platform’s Web3 tools to launder funds stolen in a $1.5 billion heist from the trading platform Bybit. 

Netherlands and US team up in illicit crypto use hunt

Meanwhile, the Netherlands and US authorities announced on Sunday that they had taken down the VerifTools marketplace, an online store selling fake identification documents.

According to a press statement seen by Cryptopolitan, the marketplace accepted digital asset payments for forged documents for as little as $9. Per the investigators, two physical servers in Amsterdam were seized together with 21 virtual servers supporting the operation.

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