Settlement Agreement between the U.S. Department of the Treasury’s Office of Foreign Assets Control and Payward, Inc. ('Kraken')

The U.S. Department of the Treasury’s Office of Foreign Assets Control (OFAC) today announced a settlement with Payward, Inc. d/b/a Kraken ("Kraken"), a Delaware-incorporated virtual currency exchange with operations in the United States and elsewhere.  Kraken agreed to remit $362,158.70 to settle its potential civil liability for apparent violations of sanctions against Iran.  As part of its settlement with OFAC, Kraken also has agreed to invest an additional $100,000 in certain sanctions compliance controls.  Due to Kraken’s failure to timely implement appropriate geolocation tools, including an automated internet protocol (IP) address blocking system, Kraken exported services to users who appeared to be in Iran when they engaged in virtual currency transactions on Kraken’s platform.  For more information, please visit the following web notice.