Binance brokers like Nominex continue to serve Russia

Binance announced, with a great deal of fanfare, the sale of its Russian business unit to newly-setup exchange CommEX. And as part of this announcement, it highlighted that “operating in Russia is not compatible with Binance’s compliance strategy.”

However, a more thorough analysis seemed to suggest that CommEX was a white-label exchange that relied on Binance Cloud offerings and was likely even sharing liquidity with the existing Binance exchange. This raised serious questions about whether or not Binance had lived up to its stated intention to “fully exit Russia.”

The Context: Binance woes in Russia disappear

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CommEX appears to be only one of the firms relying on Binance technology or liquidity to serve the Russian market. Nominex, the creator of “entertrading” — a portmanteau of entertainment and trading — advertises itself as an “Official Binance Broker,” and even specifically highlights that “all funds are stored on Binance and, in fact, transactions are also executed on the Binance exchange.”

Nominex can help you become a Binance broker, pointing out that its “expert team will guide you through the entire process, from platform customization to seamless integration with the Binance Brokerage Program.”

Similarities between Binance US and Nominex.

Read more: Binance raises red flags by selling Russian arm to brand-new CommEX

Nominex is registered in the Seychelles but appears to have some connections to Russia. It has an official Telegram channel for Russia, and while its terms of service do forbid users from the Republic of Seychelles, the United States, Iran, Iraq, North Korea, and a variety of other nations, it doesn’t forbid Russian traders.

The company is led by Pavel Shkitin, whose previous experience, according to his LinkedIn profile, includes stints with several Russian firms. The chief technology officer is Alexander Petrovich, and his LinkedIn also shows previous experience with Russian entities and a location in Russia.

Protos has reached out to Binance to determine whether or not it’s serving Russian markets and will update if we hear back. We attempted to reach out to Nominex, but the only public email address we could find was undeliverable.

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