Telegram app of choice
A new study has found that Chinese-speaking criminal organizations laundered approximately $16.1bn through digital currency dealings in 2025.
New York-based Chainalysis shared its report last week on X, stating that the Chinese networks handled around 20% of the world’s dirty cryptocurrency transactions, which amounted to $82bn:
Head of National Security Intelligence for the blockchain analysis firm, Andrew Fierman, stated that the illegal networks conduct most of their business via the Telegram messaging app.
Fierman said the illegal platforms use Telegram to facilitate money laundering, human trafficking, and even “selling Starlink satellite equipment that ends up in scam operations across Southeast Asia.”
Criminals favor crypto
The Chainalysis exec said the customers included sophisticated criminal networks and “government actors facing international sanctions.”
According to the company, the bad actors’ preference for crypto comes from it being simple to exchange into cash, and that it most likely won’t get frozen like it would in regular banks.
In October, however, the US Treasury managed to seize $15bn worth of Bitcoin from alleged scam center kingpin Chen Zhi. Unlike Zhi, who was arrested and extradited to China in January to face justice, Fierman said most criminals “particularly favor stablecoins like USDT from Tether and USDC from Circle.”
The Chainalysis exec said the two stablecoins “stay at a steady value” compared to the USD and “don’t swing wildly in price like Bitcoin or Ethereum.”
Casinos the go-to
CNBC cited Professor of Criminology at the University of Portsmouth Mark Button as saying: “Casinos are a classic means to launder any criminal proceeds,” with those in Southeast Asia a hotbed for scam centers.
originate outside of China in casino scam centers
Many of the transactions in Mandarin, stated the report, actually originate outside of China in casino scam centers of Cambodia and Myanmar.
Button also pointed out China’s ruthless crackdown on organized crime is why Chinese criminal networks often relocate to Cambodia or Myanmar, where laws are looser and corruption the name of the game.
