Illegal gold mining has grown into one of the Western Hemisphere’s largest and fastest‑expanding illicit economies, out‑earning narcotics in parts of Colombia and Peru and pushing conflict‑linked gold toward U.S. ports and banks.
Jeffrey Epstein remained embedded in Wall Street’s elite financial networks in the years before his 2019 death, maintaining accounts at more than 20 banks and executing large transactions with prominent investment firms, according to new reporting by The Wall Street Journal.
A previously undisclosed report by the Inspector General for the U.S. State Department and officials interviewed by ProPublica allege that former Ambassador to El Salvador Ronald D. Johnson protected Salvadoran President Nayib Bukele from American and Salvadoran law enforcement efforts.
North Korea’s government-backed IT workers are quietly infiltrating global tech firms and contractor platforms, earning steady crypto salaries that are laundered through a sprawling network of intermediaries to fund the regime’s weapons programs, according to new analysis from Chainalysis.
French authorities are investigating a crude oil tanker suspected of operating within a “shadow fleet” moving Russian oil, after the vessel “Boracay” anchored off Saint-Nazaire, Reuters said citing the French Navy.
International payments cooperative Swift will launch a permissioned blockchain to route transactions among global banks as part of a bid to modernize cross-border payments and blunt the rise of dollar-pegged stablecoins.
Pig-butchering schemes have scaled into a multibillion-dollar criminal industry, according to a new report by blockchain analytics firm Elliptic cited by CoinDesk.
U.S. federal prosecutions for drug crimes have fallen to their lowest level in decades this year after the Trump administration redirected agents to immigration enforcement, according to a Reuters analysis.
The former chairman of the board at Puerto Rico–based Nodus International Bank, pleaded guilty to conspiracy to commit wire fraud for his role in a $13.6-million scheme that contributed to the institution’s 2023 collapse.
A sharp pickup in mergers, acquisitions and initial public offerings is reviving Wall Street’s job market, prompting big banks to add senior deal makers and delay planned cuts.