A7A5 ruble stablecoin tops $110B in onchain activity

The security firm CertiK reported that the ruble‑backed stablecoin A7A5 processed more than $110 billion in cumulative onchain transactions and captured about 43% of the global non‑US dollar stablecoin market. CertiK found holder wallets rose from roughly 13,000 in February 2025 to about 29,000 by May 2026.

CertiK traced A7A5’s issuance to January 2025 by Old Vector LLC, a Kyrgyz entity acting for A7 LLC, a cross‑border settlement firm co‑owned by Ilan Shor and state‑linked lender Promsvyazbank. Russian regulators later recognized A7A5 under the country’s digital financial assets framework. The European Union adopted its 19th sanctions package on Oct. 23, 2025 and banned transactions involving A7A5 from Nov. 12, 2025.

The report describes technical and operational features that sustained the token’s activity after sanctions. A7A5’s smart contracts do not include a centralized kill switch; wallet and freeze controls are held by developers based in Russia and Kyrgyzstan rather than by Western infrastructure.

CertiK reported that the stablecoin’s fiat reserves sit mainly in Central Asian banking corridors, particularly in Kyrgyzstan, and within the Russian banking system. The firm found A7A5 uses decentralized finance liquidity pools on platforms such as Curve and Uniswap to support tradability without relying on centralized exchanges.

Trading activity was concentrated on Grinex, identified as the successor to the Garantex exchange. CertiK recorded roughly $11.2 billion in A7A5/RUB volume and $6.1 billion in A7A5/USDT trades, largely routed through Grinex. U.S. authorities seized the Garantex domain in March 2025, and Tether froze about $28 million in USDT tied to wallets controlled by Garantex.

Jonathan Riss, an OSINT and blockchain intelligence analyst at CertiK, wrote: “While Western regulators cannot directly rewrite the Ethereum or Tron blockchain to erase A7A5, the EU’s 19th package and parallel US/UK actions target the physical and digital choke points.”

Ilan Shor holds a majority stake in A7 LLC. He served as a Moldovan lawmaker and was convicted in connection with a 2014 bank fraud case. Shor left Moldova in 2019, obtained Russian citizenship and was sentenced in absentia to 15 years in prison in 2023; he currently resides in Moscow. CertiK links the stablecoin project to cross‑border settlement operations associated with A7 LLC.

CertiK based its assessment on onchain metrics and network analysis that show substantial transaction volumes, concentrated exchange routing and reserve placements outside Western banking corridors.