U.S. Treasury Targets Huione Group for $4B Money Laundering Scheme

The U.S. Treasury Department has initiated a significant enforcement action against the Cambodian financial firm Huione Group, citing its alleged involvement in laundering billions of dollars in illicit funds. The proposal, which has been approved by the Treasury’s Financial Crimes Enforcement Network (FinCEN), seeks to designate Huione as a “primary money laundering concern” under Section 311 of the USA PATRIOT Act. If this designation is finalized, it will prohibit all U.S. financial institutions from opening or maintaining accounts for Huione Group or any of its subsidiaries.

According to FinCEN, Huione Group has become a major financial conduit for cybercriminal organizations and transnational crime syndicates operating in Southeast Asia. The network is accused of laundering cryptocurrency proceeds from various illicit activities, including online investment scams, cryptocurrency fraud, and cyber heists. Additionally, Huione has ties to a North Korean hacking group, making it a “marketplace of choice for malicious cyber actors,” as stated by U.S. Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent. The proposed action aims to sever Huione Group’s access to correspondent banking, thereby degrading these groups’ ability to launder their ill-gotten gains.

Between August 2021 and January 2025, Huione allegedly conducted over $4 billion in suspicious transactions. These transactions include at least $37 million from a North Korea-linked cyberattack, $36 million from a “pig butchering” scam, and nearly $300 million from other illicit activities. The investigation revealed that Huione’s network includes several entities such as Huione Pay, a fiat payment platform, Huione Crypto, a virtual asset service provider, and Hoawang Guarantee, a digital marketplace. These units are alleged to collaborate and mask the origins of illicit funds, potentially even issuing a stablecoin to streamline transactions across platforms.

The FinCEN report specifically highlighted the links between Huione and the North Korea state-sponsored hacking group called Lazarus. In one instance, Huione Pay received over $150,000 in crypto from a wallet associated with Lazarus between June 2023 and February 2024. While Huione Pay previously claimed ignorance of the funds’ origin, FinCEN argues that the company’s weak compliance framework allowed such transactions to occur unnoticed. North Korea has a history of using cryptocurrency to evade international sanctions, making enforcement challenging due to the anonymous nature of cross-border transactions.

FinCEN’s investigation also noted a lack of safety protocols and regulatory oversight across the Huione platform, including the implementation of anti-money laundering (AML) and Know Your Customer (KYC) controls. The investigation observed that Huione failed to implement even basic measures to monitor, detect, or report suspicious activity, leaving the system vulnerable to exploitation by criminal and hostile nation-states. This positions Huione among the most dangerous unregulated financial entities currently operating in the crypto market.

The proposal is now entering a 30-day public consultation period, during which U.S. authorities will assess feedback before making a final ruling. If a ban is implemented on Huione, it will have a significant global impact on their business, as many cross-border transactions rely on the U.S. dollar. This move underscores the U.S. government’s commitment to combating financial crimes and ensuring the integrity of the global financial system.