Binance’s Former Russia Head, Blum Co-Founder Arrested in Connection to Fraud Case

Vladimir Smerkis, the former head of the Russian Binance division, was arrested in Russia for being associated with a large case of criminal fraud, DAS of local media reported on Sunday.

The District Court of Samoskvoretský, who lives in Moscow, complied with the investigator’s request to detain Smerkis, TASS said an unnamed source for the coercive authorities. The report did not share specific details of the fraud. Coindesk was unable to contact the district court for more information for more information.

Smerkis co -founded Blum’s business application in December 2023, but the company said he had resigned on Saturday X from his role as marketing director and is no longer involved in the project. He was also a control partner of four other businesses, including Tokenbox.io and the token fund according to LinkedIn.

Before Blum, Smerkis has worked for Binance Crypto Exchange since 2022 for less than two years. At that time, according to Linkedin, he was the head of Russia and later the head of his community of independent states (CIS). The CIS is a group of 11 nations which coordinates key decisions such as trade and law; Russia is one of these nations.

Binance did not return the request for comment.