The amount of money used illicitly to buy cryptocurrency hit a record $20.1 billion last year, as the number of transactions involving US-sanctioned companies rose sharply.
The cryptocurrency market crashed in 2022 as investor appetite for risk waned and several cryptocurrency companies filed for bankruptcy. The significant losses for investors prompted regulators to call for greater consumer protection.
According to Chainalysis, transactions connected to blocked companies increased more than 100,000 times in 2022. They made up 44% of all illegal activities in the previous year.
Funds received by Russian exchange Garantex, which the US Treasury Department sanctioned in April, accounted for “much of the illicit volume of 2022,” with “likely Russian users using a Russian exchange” accounting for the lion’s share. of that activity. Wallets are illicit if they are not part of a sanctioned entity.
The United States also imposed sanctions on Blender and Tornado Cash last year. He claimed that hackers, including those in North Korea, were using them to reap billions of dollars in cybercrime proceeds.
The volume of other illegal cryptocurrency transactions, such as those related to scams, ransomware, terrorist financing, and human trafficking, decreased last year. However, stolen funds increased by 7%.
His $20.1 billion estimate only includes blockchain activity and excludes “off-chain” crimes, such as fraudulent accounting by cryptocurrency companies.
The figure also excludes cases where cryptocurrencies are the proceeds of non-cryptocurrency crimes, such as drug trafficking.
bitcoin cash
Bitcoin Cash (BCH) prices have risen nearly 10% in the past 24 hours as traders anticipate potential changes to the network ahead of the protocol’s hard fork in May.
BCH broke the $108 resistance and reached a high of $125 on Friday, according to the price chart. Buying interest could drive the price to at least $150, the next resistance level. Smaller transaction sizes, which could enable the creation of Bitcoin Cash-based applications that offer recurring payments, derivatives trading, and crowdfunding opportunities, among other uses, to Bitcoin Cash users, are already in the works.
