According to FT, from late 2024 to August 2025, $1.1 billion from A7-linked entities was deposited into accounts at Standard Chartered in Hong Kong, $273 million passed through DBS in Hong Kong, Citigroup clients received $74 million, and about $18 million went through Deutsche Bank.
At First Abu Dhabi Bank, A7 opened accounts for 17 entities, from which more than $1.8 billion in outgoing payments was processed. Entities in the network also opened accounts at JPMorgan Chase and DBS, and a little more than half of the tracked money flows ultimately went to accounts at Chinese banks.
FT found confirmation of payments through 100 A7 shell companies. The documents say the network has at least 100 more such entities, including 61 in the UAE, 87 in Hong Kong, 16 in Kyrgyzstan, and 14 in Indonesia.
To pass bank compliance checks, A7, according to FT, used forged documents and a library of thousands of corporate seals — both fake and copied from genuine company documents whose owners were unaware of it. Employees were instructed to replace customs codes for sanctioned goods with similar codes for products not subject to restrictions and to remove the “Russian trace” from documents, including Cyrillic.
In one case in February 2025, A7 processed a payment of 3.6 million yuan, or $510,000, for 500 night-vision devices for a Russian client. Documents for the bank were prepared showing a purchase of tempered glass; employees discussed whether to list shoes instead, but decided to keep “glass” so the documents would match previous payments.
After Standard Chartered suspected something was wrong in February 2025, the recipients’ A7 accounts were closed, and the network became more active in processing payments through the UAE. First Abu Dhabi Bank told FT that all identified A7-linked accounts had already been closed; Standard Chartered, Citigroup, JPMorgan, and Deutsche Bank said they were committed to anti-money-laundering requirements.
A7 had previously already been under sanctions from the UK, the EU, and the US. The UK added the company to its sanctions list in May 2025, the EU in July, linking A7 to attempts to influence the 2024 presidential election in Moldova and the referendum on the country’s accession to the European Union, and the US imposed restrictions in August, citing support for the sanctioned crypto exchange Garantex and its successor Grinex.
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