Specter links 28,600 BTC wallet cluster to Zhimin Qian laundering case

A wallet cluster holding 28,600 BTC worth about $1.8 billion appears to be linked to wallets previously attributed to the Zhimin Qian money-laundering case, blockchain investigator Specter said. The finding follows a transfer made weeks ago from an address that had been dormant since 2017, when 1,020 BTC worth about $60 million was moved and then distributed across multiple addresses in a pattern Specter said matched money-laundering behavior. Specter’s tracing connected the cluster to addresses associated with the U.K. investigation into Zhimin Qian. Qian Zhimin was later sentenced in the UK to more than 11 years in prison on charges of laundering Bitcoin proceeds from an investment fraud in China that targeted around 130,000 people. UK police previously seized 60,000 BTC in connection with the case. Specter said most of the newly identified addresses have remained largely dormant since June 2021, but added that on-chain evidence alone cannot determine whether the wallets are still controlled by the same actor, by another custodian, or are already under law enforcement control.