Key Takeaways
- Bolivian officers met with the U.S. DEA to probe Sebastian Marset, captured March 13, for crypto cash laundering.
- Chainalysis studies that world crypto cash laundering surged 8x since 2020, reaching an enormous $82B in 2025.
- The DEA and Bolivian Police will examine corporations receiving illicit crypto to trace Marset’s crime community.
Bolivian Officers Meet With US DEA to Sort out Drug-Linked Crypto Cash Laundering
World regulators are strengthening their integration and collaboration to sort out using cryptocurrency for illicit functions, corresponding to drug-related cash laundering.
On Tuesday, Bolivia’s anti-drug czar, Ernesto Justiniano, and the director of the Bolivian Particular Anti-Narcotics Pressure (FELCN), Frans William Cabrera Quispe, traveled to Washington and met with the U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA) to strengthen the cooperation of each international locations within the combat in opposition to drug trafficking and legal organizations concerned with these teams.
The principle focus of this journey could be to coordinate an investigation into the legal networks behind Sebastian Marset, referred to as the fashionable Pablo Escobar, who was captured on March 13 in Bolivia, along with different legal drug teams that function in Latam. Amongst these are the First Capital Command (PCC) and the Purple Command (Comando Vermelho), two Brazilian teams which have been accused of laundering tens of millions utilizing digital currencies.
Marset, at the moment underneath U.S. custody, is being accused of laundering tens of millions utilizing “couriers and tokens to covertly ship bulk illicit foreign money, usually in euros,” in line with an unsealed indictment.
Speaking to native media, Justiniano said that, along with the funds coming from the sale of those narcotics, they had been “additionally wanting into the matter of corporations which will have been diverting chemical compounds” and “cash laundering—particularly, corporations which have acquired funds by way of cryptocurrencies.”
Mirko Sokol, Common Commander of the Bolivian Police, burdened that intelligence indicated that Marset carried out transactions “primarily in cryptocurrencies, slightly than in bodily foreign money,” and the investigations are following this lead.
Cryptocurrency cash laundering has been on the rise, with investigators sounding the alarm concerning the rising use of crypto belongings for these illicit actions. Chainalysis, a blockchain intelligence agency, said that cryptocurrency laundering volumes rose to $82 billion in 2025, with Chinese language teams on the helm.
Volumes have grown 8x since 2020, when Chainalysis registered solely $10 billion.
