Crypto

Hong Kong has granted its first licenses for fiat-backed stablecoins to HSBC and a Standard Chartered-led joint venture, marking a significant step in the city’s effort to build a regulated market for virtual currencies used in finance and trade.

Iran is seeking to collect transit tolls from oil tankers passing through the Strait of Hormuz in cryptocurrency, a move that could deepen the role of digital assets in the country’s sanctions-hit economy.

A sprawling scam compound on Cambodia’s border with Thailand housed an estimated 10,000 workers and included offices, dormitories, villas, and restaurants, underscoring the industrial scale of Southeast Asia’s cyberfraud industry.

The U.S. Treasury Department on Wednesday proposed new anti-money-laundering and sanctions-compliance rules for permitted payment stablecoin issuers, marking a major step in implementing the 2025 GENIUS Act and expanding federal oversight of the sector.

A Russian cryptocurrency payments network founded by sanctioned actors is expanding into Africa as Moscow seeks new channels to move money around western restrictions imposed after the invasion of Ukraine.

Several senior Binance compliance officials overseeing sanctions, investigations, and financial-crime monitoring have left the company in recent months as the crypto exchange faces renewed scrutiny over alleged sanctions evasion and illicit-finance risks.

A politically connected blockchain project that partnered with the Trump family’s crypto firm promoted a proposed resort in Timor-Leste involving three people later sanctioned by the United States for ties to the Prince Group, an alleged Southeast Asian scam syndicate.

Americans reported more than 1-million internet-crime complaints to the FBI in 2025, with disclosed losses rising to a record $20.877 billion, up 26 percent from the prior year, according to the bureau’s annual IC3 report published Monday. 

The Commodity Futures Trading Commission sued Arizona, Illinois, and Connecticut on Thursday, escalating the Trump administration’s defense of prediction markets and arguing that the federal agency has exclusive authority over contracts offered by platforms such as Kalshi.

Cambodia’s parliament on Friday passed the country’s first law specifically aimed at combating online scam centers, setting prison terms and fines for fraud, money laundering, data theft, and recruitment tied to the illicit industry as scrutiny intensifies over the country’s role in global cyber scams.