A Beijing court has sentenced seven individuals to prison terms ranging from 3 to 14.5 years for orchestrating a $20 million money laundering operation using Bitcoin. The perpetrators, including a former Kuaishou video platform employee, embezzled approximately 140 million yuan ($19.3 million) by manipulating internal reward systems and creating fake vendor accounts.
The funds were laundered through eight offshore cryptocurrency exchanges, converted to Bitcoin and other digital assets, then obscured using coin-mixing services. Beijing's Haidian District prosecutors employed advanced blockchain forensics to trace the transactions, recovering 92 BTC (worth ~$11.7 million at the time) which was returned to Kuaishou.
This case emerges amid China's stringent anti-crypto stance, including its 2021 blanket ban on trading and mining. Recent warnings from Shenzhen authorities about rising crypto fraud had already signaled heightened scrutiny. While some speculated China might soften its position due to stablecoin interest, this high-profile laundering incident threatens to trigger stricter regulations and enforcement.