Analysis of $3.4 Billion USDT Inflow: Division of Labor in Southeast Asian Fraud Networks

An analysis has revealed that over $3.4 billion USDT has flowed into the addresses of virtual asset guarantee platforms in Southeast Asia in the first half of 2026. This amount includes deposits and monthly usage fees, and cannot be considered the total criminal proceeds or actual laundering amounts.

Bitrace, in collaboration with ODaily, explained that Southeast Asian fraud organizations have established a division of labor structure that includes recruiting personnel, stealing personal information, creating fake investment apps, telephone mediation, luring victims, long-term conversational fraud, and over-the-counter (OTC) currency exchange. ODaily reported that over 90% of the $3.4 billion USDT is related to new coin guarantees.

The organization resembles a network of functionally connected operators rather than a single fixed company. Roles are divided among personnel recruiters, personal information sellers, app developers, telephone mediators, fraud conversation managers, OTC operators, and guarantee platforms.

In such a structure, even if a specific platform or wallet is shut down, the flow of funds and operations can be transferred to other operators or addresses. This is why there are analyses suggesting that if law enforcement targets individual organizations, the entire ecosystem could be restructured.

Investigations have shown that groups recruiting personnel for fraud organizations and personal information inquiry services were operating on Telegram. The original text noted that about 5,000 people participated in one recruitment group, with personnel prices quoted at several thousand USDT to over 10,000 USDT.

Regarding personal information inquiry services, it was reported that in a group with over 3,000 participants, information such as household registration, marriage, medical, asset, and vehicle details were traded for tens to hundreds of USDT. The number of members and the actual transaction scale require separate verification.

The production of fake exchanges and decentralized applications (DApps) has also been outsourced. Development services were introduced that attach multilingual features and trading functions for futures, options, forex, stocks, and NFTs to screens similar to OKX, but no specific distribution numbers or damage scales from particular companies were provided.

Funds were moved by converting fiat currency into Tether (USDT). The first organization received victim remittances or gambling funds into bank accounts, purchased USDT, and then transferred it to the second organization, which is an anonymous OTC operator.

Subsequently, the funds may pass through various wallets and guarantee platforms, making them difficult to trace. However, blockchain transaction records are public, and with the cooperation of issuers, exchanges, and law enforcement agencies, freezing can occur, so it cannot be concluded that USDT itself is an untraceable asset.

Bitrace reported in a separate report that $10.9 billion USDT flowed into the deposit addresses of illegal trading guarantee platforms in 2025. The figures for the first half of 2026, which amount to $3.4 billion USDT, differ in calculation periods and address ranges, making it impossible to calculate growth rates or market expansion.

Bitrace stated that a significant portion of the high-risk funds received by illegal trading guarantee platforms, human trafficking, fraud organizations, and casinos in Southeast Asia and East Asia in 2025 was USDT on the TRON (TRX) network. The same report estimated that the inflow amount to high-risk addresses related to black and gray markets was $186.9 billion (approximately 250.7 trillion KRW), with $186.7 billion (approximately 250.4 trillion KRW) occurring on the TRON network.

The United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime (UNODC) analyzed that Southeast Asian organized crime has developed into an ecosystem combining fraud centers, online gambling, casinos, underground finance, and human trafficking. The annual revenue of cyber fraud organizations was estimated to be between $27.4 billion and $36.5 billion (approximately 36.8 trillion to 48.9 trillion KRW), but there is uncertainty in the estimates of labor force and per capita revenue.

The U.S. Department of Justice announced that in April 2026, during an operation related to Southeast Asian fraud centers, it seized 503 fake investment websites and identified $700,196,239.15 (approximately 941.4 billion KRW) in cryptocurrency as assets related to money laundering, which were frozen and confiscated. As of March 2026, law enforcement agencies informed 8,935 victims of the fraud and prevented an additional loss of $562,762,624.5 (approximately 754.4 billion KRW).

In January 2026, the U.S. Department of Justice held a cryptocurrency working group in Southeast Asia, providing training on tracking TRON and Ethereum, OTC brokers, and cryptocurrency freezing procedures. This reflects a trend where on-chain tracking by private analysis firms is conducted alongside asset freezing by law enforcement agencies.

Tether announced that its T3 Financial Crime Response Department, operated with TRON and TRM Labs, froze over $300 million (approximately 402.3 billion KRW) in crime-related assets as of October 2025. This indicates that funds passing through OTC routes and multiple wallets can also be frozen with the cooperation of issuers and law enforcement agencies.

As seen in cases of detecting money laundering organizations in the Southeast Asian virtual asset sector, virtual asset crimes are being addressed alongside investment fraud, personal information theft, and online fraud operations. However, it is difficult to determine whether the $3.4 billion USDT is actual criminal proceeds or the total transaction amount of the guarantee platform based solely on the publicly available calculation basis.

The FATF pointed out the money laundering risks of peer-to-peer transactions using stablecoins and non-custodial wallets, suggesting that issuers, virtual asset operators, and financial institutions should strengthen their controls. This analysis is evaluated as a case showing the process by which stablecoins, possessing higher liquidity and ease of cross-border transfer than USDT itself, are incorporated into the payment infrastructure of illegal industries.

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