According to Ta Kung Pao, the Hong Kong police successfully dismantled a cross-border money laundering syndicate on the 13th of this month. The amount involved exceeded 100 million. During the operation, 6 people were arrested, including a principal criminal and two key members. One of the key members is a college student and is mainly responsible for purchasing virtual currencies.
The police received a tip-off at the end of April this year that a criminal syndicate had used debit cards from a number of mainland banks to collect proceeds from fraud, and then used these debit cards to purchase goldware and luxury watches in Hong Kong and resell them. The cash obtained from the resale is used to purchase virtual currency for a second cleansing process. The group mainly operates on working days in order to take advantage of the fact that financial institutions can instantly access accounts and commit crimes before law enforcement agencies freeze their accounts.