Suspicious activity reports filed by U.S. financial institutions show that Mexican drug cartels and human traffickers are laundering dirty funds through Chinese money laundering networks (CMLNs) operating in the United States, according to the U.S. Department of the Treasury’s Financial Crimes Enforcement Network (FinCEN).
Mexican drug cartels are limited in the amount of U.S. dollars they can deposit into Mexican banks, while Chinese citizens want U.S. dollars, according to FinCEN’s advisory. The PRC limits the amount of money Chinese citizens can transfer outside the country each year, so many Chinese citizens feel compelled to purchase dollars after reading advertisements on social media. The problem is that it is CMLNs that placed the ads, after buying dirty dollars from the cartels, FinCEN said.
