Su Jingliang, a Beijing man, was sentenced to 46 months in prison and ordered to pay $26.87 million (approximately 187 million yuan) in restitution for his involvement in a "pig butchering" scam that laundered over $36.9 million (approximately 256 million yuan). The US had previously dismantled a transnational fraud and money laundering ring that built trust with victims through social media or dating apps, then guided them to fake cryptocurrency trading platforms for so-called "investments." Funds from 174 US victims flowed into 74 shell company accounts registered in the US, and were converted into Tether (USDT) once the funds arrived. Su Jingliang reportedly played a key "accountant" role in this "pig butchering" scam chain. He communicated with Deltec Bank employees via the encrypted messaging app Telegram, receiving funds from the US shell companies. He also directed the bank to quickly convert the transferred US dollar assets into the stablecoin USDT and send them to specific cryptocurrency wallets starting with "TRteo," whose funds ultimately flowed to fraud rings in Southeast Asia. (Caixin.com)