Huione and Prince Group

As of September 2026: Chen Zhi is in Chinese custody and has not faced trial in the US. The forfeiture of 127,271 bitcoin is contested and unresolved, and the bitcoin's dollar value has fallen from the US$15 billion figure DOJ cited in October 2025. The proposed extension of the Huione measure to H-Pay Service PLC is not final.

Also known as: Huione Group · Prince Holding Group · Chen Zhi case.

What happened?

Two Cambodian names sit at the center of the largest actions the US has taken against the Southeast Asian scam economy. Huione Group is a financial and marketplace ecosystem whose parts included a payments company, a crypto business and a guarantee marketplace where criminals bought and sold laundering services. Prince Group is a conglomerate whose chairman, Chen Zhi, was charged by US prosecutors with running forced-labor scam compounds in Cambodia.

The compounds ran “pig-butchering” frauds. Workers, many of them trafficked, cultivated online relationships with victims in the US and elsewhere and steered them into fake crypto investments. The result was a steady inflow of stolen money that needed to be cleaned and moved out of reach. FinCEN said Huione Group laundered at least US$4 billion in illicit proceeds between August 2021 and January 2025, including scam funds and proceeds of North Korean hacks.

Which techniques did it use?

The scam economy needs three things: a way to receive victim payments, a way to hide where they went, and a way to turn them into usable money. The Huione ecosystem offered all three.

Its guarantee marketplace worked as an escrow service, letting strangers trade laundering and scam-support services. The payments and crypto arms moved value in dollar stablecoins and other assets. Funds passed through many wallets, which resembles chain-hopping, and were cashed out through OTC brokers and accounts held by money mules.

How was it found?

The public record describes a staged effort. FinCEN issued its finding on Huione on May 1, 2025. In October 2025 DOJ unsealed the Prince Group indictment and forfeiture complaint the same day the US and UK announced sanctions. Blockchain analytics firms including Chainalysis, Elliptic and TRM Labs published their own tracing of the network’s wallets.

What was the outcome?

Huione. FinCEN’s final rule, published October 16, 2025 and effective November 17, 2025, prohibits covered US financial institutions from opening or maintaining correspondent accounts for Huione Group, including Haowang Guarantee (formerly Huione Guarantee), Huione Pay and Huione Crypto. On June 23, 2026 DOJ announced seizure of backend infrastructure used by Huione’s laundering services. Two days later FinCEN proposed extending the measure to H-Pay Service PLC and any defined successor entity, so the designation follows the business if it changes name.

Prince Group. On October 14, 2025, prosecutors unsealed an indictment in Brooklyn charging Chen Zhi with wire fraud conspiracy and money laundering conspiracy, and filed a civil forfeiture complaint for 127,271 bitcoin valued at more than US$15 billion, the largest forfeiture action in US history. The US and UK sanctioned 146 targets the same day. In June 2026, OFAC added nine individuals and 26 entities.

Chen Zhi was arrested in Cambodia and sent to China in January 2026, so he is not facing the US charges in a US court. The forfeiture case is contested. As of March 2026, the ICIJ reported that scam victims, people asserting claims through a mining operation called LuBian, and Prince Group itself were disputing the government’s account, and that China had accused the US of taking the coins through a 2020 hack. The dollar value of the bitcoin has since fallen well below the US$15 billion headline.

What were the warning signs?

For banks and analysts, the public record points to several recurring signals.

• A marketplace built around escrow for illicit services. A platform where vendors advertise laundering and scam support is a direct indicator of what its users are doing.
• Wallets that collect from many unrelated victims. A cluster that receives small payments from thousands of people and forwards them in bulk looks like a collection point for fraud, not commerce.
• Stablecoin volumes that do not match the business. A payments company processing billions in dollar-linked tokens with little visible commerce behind it deserves scrutiny.
• Counterparties already on sanctions lists. FinCEN cited proceeds of North Korean hacks among the flows it associated with Huione.
• A rebranding after pressure. New entity names and new wallets appearing right after an enforcement action are why the successor-entity proposal exists.

What changed afterwards?

The two actions changed the target. Instead of chasing individual scammers who can be replaced overnight, authorities went after the businesses that made scamming efficient: the bank access, the marketplace, the payment rails and the parent company. Cutting an institution off from correspondent banking is powerful because it removes its access to dollars, and it puts every bank that keeps dealing with it at risk.

The cases also show the hard parts. Laundering businesses rebrand when banned, which is why FinCEN’s successor-entity proposal matters. Seizing an enormous crypto haul raises questions about who is owed it, with scam victims arguing they should be paid first. And the man at the center is beyond the reach of US courts. For how tips and analytics become enforcement, see the detection overview.

First published September 21, 2026 · Last updated September 21, 2026 · Legal statuses current as of September 2026