The Spanish bank Santander, which has offices all over the world, including South America, has lost an appeal against a crypto exchange filed to the Court of Justice of the State of São Paulo.
The bank was sued back in 2018 by the crypto exchange Mercado Bitcoin for closing its account without prior notice.
At that time, the bank argued that it had decided to suspend the exchange's account simply because the company was engaged in crypto trading.
When the account was closed, the trading platform had a balance of about 1 million reals ($350,000). The court ordered the bank to return the funds to its owner, however, the bank filed an appeal.
Now, the court has rejected the appeal and ordered Santander bank to return all the funds as well as to pay a monthly fine equivalent to 1% of the interest on the blocked funds.
Why it is important
- Santander bank's decision to suspend the exchange's account is not that surprising, as in some jurisdictions, for example in India, the law actually bans banks from offering their services to any company related to digital assets.
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