Cryptocurrency transfers between South Korea’s largest exchanges and Cambodia’s Huione Guarantee surged nearly 1,400 times last year.
Key Takeaways:
- Crypto transfers between South Korea’s top exchanges and Cambodia’s Huione Guarantee surged 1,400x to $8.9 million in 2024.
- The US and UK–sanctioned Huione Group is suspected of laundering funds tied to fraud, cybercrime, and human trafficking.
- All five Korean exchanges have suspended transactions with Huione, as regulators tighten anti–money laundering oversight.
The surge has raised alarms among regulators and lawmakers over possible money-laundering links to transnational criminal networks operating in Southeast Asia.
Korean Crypto Exchanges Halt Transfers After $8.9M Surge in Crime Transactions
According to data from the Financial Supervisory Service (FSS), obtained by opposition lawmaker Rep. Lee Yang-soo, transfers between Korea’s five major crypto exchanges, including Upbit, Bithumb, Coinone, Korbit, and Gopax and Huione Guarantee reached 12.8 billion won ($8.9 million) in 2024.
The figure is up from just 9.22 million won in the previous year. The dramatic spike prompted all five exchanges to suspend transactions with the Cambodian platform.
Huione Group, the Phnom Penh-based parent company of Huione Guarantee, has been sanctioned by both the US and UK governments for allegedly laundering digital assets tied to fraud, cybercrime, and human trafficking.
Its virtual asset arm is believed to serve as a key financial conduit for these networks.
Bithumb recorded the largest exposure, with transfers jumping from 9.22 million won in 2023 to 12.4 billion won last year.
Upbit, which had no prior dealings with Huione, logged another 366.9 million won in inflows and outflows.
The activity has continued into 2025, totaling 3.15 billion won in transactions as of October 20, far above pre-2024 levels.
Today, OFAC and FinCEN, with UK's FCDO, designated the Prince Group TCO and 146 associates, while Huione Group was named under Section 311 of the USA PATRIOT Act. DOJ also seized a record $15B in bitcoin linked to these Southeast Asian crypto scam operations. Read more here:… pic.twitter.com/MgjkMFmCbl
— Chainalysis (@chainalysis) October 14, 2025
The majority of cross-border transfers were made in Tether (USDT), a stablecoin pegged to the U.S. dollar that is often favored for cross-border remittances due to its liquidity and ease of conversion.
South Korean authorities have responded swiftly. Upbit’s operator, Dunamu, reported Huione to regulators after detecting suspicious transactions, identifying linked wallets, and imposing a full transfer ban.
Bithumb followed suit, blocking all Huione-related deposits and withdrawals in early May.
Separately, the FSS revealed that Cambodian branches of four Korean banks — Jeonbuk Bank, KB Kookmin Bank, Shinhan Bank, and Woori Bank — paid 1.45 billion won in interest to Prince Group, another Cambodia-based firm under investigation for suspected financial crimes.
Financial regulators, led by Financial Services Commission Chairman Lee Eog-weon, pledged tighter oversight, including preemptive account freezes and stricter anti–money laundering (AML) controls.
South Korean Retail Investors Pour $1.24B Into US Tech, Crypto Stocks
As reported, South Korean investors turned the Chuseok holiday into a high-risk trading week, pouring $1.24 billion into US tech and crypto-linked assets while local markets were closed between October 3 and 9, data from the Korea Securities Depository shows.
The frenzy was led by leveraged ETFs and high-growth stocks, as traders sought to ride Wall Street’s momentum amid optimism surrounding US tech resilience and domestic stimulus hopes.
Top foreign buys included the Direxion Daily Tesla Bull 2X ETF with $151 million in purchases, followed by Iris Energy ($105 million), Meta Platforms ($100 million), and Tesla ($96 million).
Investors also snapped up $95 million worth of the T-REX 2X Long BMNR Daily Target ETF, which tracks BitMine Immersion Technologies with double exposure, highlighting growing appetite for crypto-related equities.
However, the timing proved unfortunate. The buying spree ended abruptly as U.S.–China trade tensions sparked a global market pullback, erasing much of the previous week’s gains.
Meanwhile, in August, South Korea’s financial regulator moved to rein in risky lending practices in the digital asset sector, ordering local exchanges to suspend all crypto lending services until a proper regulatory framework is established.
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