A new report from Chainalysis shows that money laundering activities still only account for a very small portion of all crypto transactions.
The market analytics firm notes that while 5% of the global gross domestic product is laundered every year in fiat currency, only 0.05% of all crypto transactions are involved with money laundering.
“Overall, cybercriminals have laundered over $33 billion worth of cryptocurrency since 2017, with most of the total over time moving to centralized exchanges.
For comparison, the UN Office of Drugs and Crime estimates that between $800 billion and $2 trillion of fiat currency is laundered each year – as much as 5% of global GDP. For comparison, money laundering accounted for just 0.05% of all cryptocurrency transaction volume in 2021.”
According to Chainalysis, the overall amount of money laundered with the use of crypto in 2021 increased by 30% from 2020 and totaled $8.6 billion.
Chainalysis’ findings also show laundering of money through crypto assets is very much concentrated with just a few wallets involved.
“A group of just 583 deposit addresses received 54% of all funds sent from illicit addresses in 2021. Each of those 583 addresses received at least $1 million from illicit addresses, and in total, they received just under $2.5 billion worth of cryptocurrency.
An even smaller group of 45 addresses received 24% of all funds sent from illicit addresses for a total of just under $1.1 billion. One deposit address received just over $200 million, all from wallets associated with the Finiko Ponzi scheme.”
The sector of the crypto market that is most affected by illicit activities, the report shows, is decentralized finance (DeFi), with a 1,964% year-over-year increase in the total value of funds received from flagged wallets.
The post Chainalysis Report Shows Only 0.05% of All Crypto Transactions Are Illicit appeared first on iGaming.org.
Source: Igaming
