Money laundering means turning dirty money into clean money. How does it happen?
Suppose a corrupt official accepted 5 million in bribes.
First of all, he certainly wouldn't dare to directly accept the bank transfer from the other party. All banks in China are connected to the central bank's system, and abnormal amounts of money flowing in and out will trigger an early warning. The warning will result in a temporary freezing of the account at the mildest level, and a direct investigation at the most serious level.
Let me tell you a real case. A friend had a bank card that he seldom used, and there was almost no money flowing in and out of it. Once someone returned money to him, not much more than 200,000 yuan, and asked him to use this card. As a result, the money was immediately frozen, and it took a long time to be unfrozen. This warning is not a single indicator. It not only looks at the absolute value of the amount, but also the relative value (for example, Jack Ma's account has no problem with millions of yuan flowing in and out, but ordinary people may be triggered if millions of yuan suddenly flow in and out). It will also be based on your daily account flow. For example, if the friend's card has not been used for a long time and suddenly 200,000 yuan comes in, it will be frozen.
Therefore, the corrupt official can only accept cash. However, the problem with cash is that once you receive it, how do you spend it? It is fine to use a small amount, but if you use it to buy a house, for example, you give 5 million in cash to the developer, even if the developer accepts it, if there is an investigation for various reasons in the future, how do you explain the source of the 5 million in cash?
So the money needs to be laundered. For example, let your wife open a dry cleaning shop, buy two second-hand machines, hire someone to look after the shop, and it doesn't matter whether anyone really comes to wash clothes. Anyway, after the shop is opened, take 200,000 yuan in cash to the bank every month, and in about two years, the 5 million yuan will be deposited in the bank. The 200,000 yuan every month will be used as the income of the laundry shop, so the 5 million dirty money will be laundered and become money in the bank card that can be used openly.
This is also the origin of the term money laundering.
However, the reality is completely different now. Traditional money laundering methods are simply impossible. Now all economic activities are highly electronic. No matter how many customers your laundry shop has, most of them pay electronically. Almost no one uses cash. Then you can't explain the source of 200,000 yuan in cash every month. In addition, business operations are all interrelated. If you have a profit of 200,000 yuan per month, then the corresponding turnover should be 400,000 yuan. Then how much clothes do you need to wash, how much electricity do you need to use, how much detergent and consumables do you need to use? Once you check these, the electricity bills don't match, and the detergents and consumables you purchased don't match, and you can't explain it at all.
