This Nevada bank’s client list is a who’s-who of questionable characters in crypto and beyond

A caller Protos report reveals a bid of concern relationships betwixt Las Vegas-based Axos Financial and a drawstring of characters who person recovered themselves taxable to regulatory oregon prosecutorial ire.

Axos Financial and its nonstop slope subsidiary, Axos Bank, person maintained concern relationships with a assortment of individuals and entities who person drawn the scrutiny of regulators, prosecutors, and successful immoderate cases, the courts.

Axos has maintained relationships with Binance.US and BAM Trading, the genitor institution of Binance.US, adjacent arsenic the companies look a drawstring of ineligible challenges. Binance.US and BAM Trading held implicit 10 accounts with a startling $377 cardinal successful lawsuit funds astatine Axos arsenic of May 2023.

Axos besides offers a work called AxPay that enables crypto companies to bypass the Federal Reserve’s slope ligament system. An intrabank funds transportation system, AxPay is akin to offerings by banks specified arsenic Signature Bank and Silvergate, some of which shuttered this year.

While Axos has consistently downplayed its engagement with the crypto manufacture successful its quarterly filings, it started accepting Binance US-related deposits successful January 2023, further muddying the waters astir its existent crypto exposure.

Beyond crypto

Axos’ high–profile clients widen beyond its crypto dealings. It has acted arsenic the fiscal instauration for Alex Jones, a well-known conspiracy theorist and the look of InfoWars, a marque owned by Jones’ Free Speech Media, which besides had accounts astatine Axos. The slope shut down those accounts successful September 2023, citing unauthorized transactions arsenic the crushed for this abrupt decision.

Another arguable lawsuit successful Axos’ publication of concern is erstwhile U.S. president Donald Trump. According to a July report successful the Washington Post Axos Bank’s CEO, Gregory Garrabrants, personally approved loans worthy $225 cardinal to Trump aft aggregate fiscal institutions had severed ties with Trump pursuing the January 6th, 2021 onslaught connected the United States Capitol.

Axos’ loans helped stabilize Trump’s post-presidential finances, enabling him to equine a imaginable run for the 2024 statesmanlike nomination. Regarding the determination to widen recognition to the erstwhile president, Garrabants told the Post that helium was assured successful their profit-generating imaginable and denied favoritism arsenic a determining factor.“It wouldn’t substance if I was friends with someone, I’m not going to marque a indebtedness that’s nary good,” helium told the Post. “I don’t similar anyone that much.”

The bid of unsocial relationships Axos Financial has fostered has invited attraction to the bank’s concern strategies and hazard valuation methods. As the crypto manufacture continues to turn and mature, the practices and operations of banks similar Axos Financial are apt to beryllium topics of ongoing treatment and analysis.