Holding 28,600 BTC, worth 1.8 billion USD, the wallet cluster is suspected to be linked to the Zhimin Qian money laundering case

According to on-chain detective Specter, it has discovered a cluster of wallets holding 28,600 BTC, worth approximately $1.8 billion, suspected to be related to wallets previously attributed to the money laundering case of Zhimin Qian.

A few weeks ago, a Bitcoin wallet that had been dormant since 2017 transferred 1,020 BTC, worth about $60 million, and began distributing funds to multiple addresses in a manner consistent with money laundering activities. After tracking these transactions, Specter found that the related wallet cluster was connected to publicly associated addresses investigated in the UK concerning Zhimin Qian. From 2014 to 2017, Zhimin Qian organized large-scale investment fraud in China, affecting over 128,000 victims. UK authorities later traced a significant amount of criminal proceeds flowing into Bitcoin, with the Met Police ultimately seizing 60,000 BTC, marking the largest cryptocurrency seizure in UK history at that time.

In July 2021, UK authorities transferred the seized BTC, creating identifiable on-chain associations. Following the recent transfer of 1,020 BTC, Specter identified additional wallets, which currently hold a total of 28,600 BTC, worth approximately $1.8 billion. These wallets have largely been dormant since June 2021. Based on on-chain evidence, it remains unclear whether these wallets are still controlled by the same actor, other custodians, or have been identified by law enforcement.