The Caribbean Supply Chain that Laundered Conflict-Tainted Venezuelan Gold
More than 70 metric tons of Venezuelan gold worth over $2.2 billion were routed through Curaçao and refined in Switzerland between 2012 and 2018, despite evidence the metal originated in conflict-affected mining areas in Venezuela.
AI Increasingly Used to Dodge Economic and Trade Sanctions
Artificial intelligence is making sanctions and export-control evasion schemes harder to detect by enabling the creation of realistic fake companies and phony documentation used to obviate international trade restrictions.
Did Citi’s Internal Security Unit Help Quash Compliance Concerns?
Citigroup faces troubling allegations that an in-house security unit comprised of former law-enforcement officials penalized two compliance staffers who came forward with regulatory concerns and helped defend the institution against a lawsuit by a former employee.
Will Dubai’s Business-Haven Brand Be a Casualty of War?
Dubai has cultivated an image as the safest haven for global capital in the Middle East, but Iranian strikes on the emirate are putting that image to a test.
As Iran’s Crypto Outflows Spike, Its Hacking Groups Go Dark
As the U.S.-Israeli attack on Iran continues, there’s a bit of split-screen in Iranian online activity at the moment. On the one screen, crypto usage has spiked sharply since the launch of the attacks. On the other, most of Iran’s state-sponsored cyber groups are nowhere to be found.
Money Launderers Have Made ‘Dramatic’ Turn to Crypto in Recent Years
Western governments are being urged to tighten controls on cryptocurrency after new research warned that criminals and hostile states have laundered an estimated $350 billion using crypto over the past two decades.
In Finland, Rising Concerns Over the Risks of Russian Real-Estate Buys
Finnish authorities are tightening scrutiny of real-estate purchases after a series of Russian-linked property deals raised fears that land and buildings near military facilities and critical infrastructure could be used for espionage or sabotage.
Epstein Files Shine a Rare Light on ‘Family Office’ Investments
A U.S. Justice Department release tied to the Jeffrey Epstein investigation has unexpectedly pulled back the curtain on “family offices”—the private, often home-office-style investment operations used by many of the world’s wealthiest families.
Tariff Evasion and Fraud Seen Behind Record Gap in U.S.-China Trade Data
A record mismatch in official trade statistics is complicating efforts to measure how far the U.S. and China have “decoupled,” according to Bloomberg, which cited an $112-billion gap between what Beijing said it exported to the United States and what U.S. Customs and Border Protection recorded as arriving.
Waste Crime Is Rising as Management Market Reaches $1.2tn in Value
Waste crime and trafficking is expanding globally, fueled by profit incentives in a fast-growing waste-management industry and compounded by major blind spots in official data, according to a newly released report by the UN Office on Drugs and Crime (UNODC).