The Lithuanian financial watchdog has once again placed the spotlight on one of the country’s most controversial cryptocurrency ventures. On August 29, the Bank of Lithuania announced a €130,000 ($151,525) fine against Pervesk UAB, a payments company deeply linked to the failed Bankera cryptocurrency project, for “significant shortcomings” in its anti–money laundering (AML) and counter-terrorist financing (CTF) controls.

The fine marks another chapter in a years-long saga surrounding Bankera, a crypto initiative that raised over €100 million from investors in 2017–2018 through an initial coin offering (ICO), only to collapse under allegations of mismanagement and misuse of investor funds. Regulators now say Pervesk, one of the central companies involved in handling those investor funds, failed to meet the most basic requirements of financial compliance, raising new concerns about whether lessons from the ICO scandal have truly been learned.

According to the Bank of Lithuania, the fine against Pervesk follows a comprehensive inspection that uncovered systemic gaps in the company’s AML and CTF processes. Regulators found that Pervesk:

In addition to the financial penalty, the regulator issued a formal warning, underlining that such failures put Lithuania’s financial system at risk of abuse. The Bank of Lithuania emphasized that while Pervesk has begun implementing corrective measures, its deficiencies were severe enough to warrant heightened supervision going forward.

The regulator’s statement pointedly noted that Pervesk’s risk management framework lacked sufficient adaptability and rigor-an especially troubling finding given the company’s historic role in processing hundreds of millions in cryptocurrency-related transactions.

Pervesk CEO Darius Kulikauskas........

© Blitz