Huione Group

Huione Group is a Cambodian financial conglomerate,[1] headquartered in Phnom Penh. Some of its products and subsidiaries include Huione Pay (banking),[1] Huione Guarantee (an escrow and deposit service sometimes used as a grey market),[2] and Huione Crypto (a cryptocurrency exchange).[2] The company is linked to Cambodia's ruling Hun family, which includes the current prime minister, Hun Manet.[3] His cousin Hun To is a major shareholder and director of Huione Pay.[4]

Money laundering charges

In July 2024, the blockchain analytics firm Elliptic linked Huione Guarantee to the sale of stolen data and money laundering services used to conduct illegal activities,[5] such as the so-called pig butchering scam.[2][3][6] In March 2025, the National Bank of Cambodia revoked Huione Pay's banking license.[1] In May, the U.S. Department of the Treasury's Financial Crimes Enforcement Network found Huione Group to be a financial institution of primary money laundering concern and proposed to sever its access to the U.S. financial system.[7] FinCEN reported that Huione Group laundered over US$4 billion in illegal funds from August 2021 to January 2025, including US$37 million from North Korean cyber heists and US$36 million from fraud scams.[8] Shortly after, Telegram deleted thousands of channels used by Huione Guarantee and banned several accounts that had operated the marketplace.[9] It has grown to become the largest criminal marketplace of all time, with transactions totalling more than $27 billion.[10]

In April 2026, Huione's former chairman Li Xiong was extradited to China to face money laundering charges. Chinese authorities described Huione as a subsidiary of Prince Group and Li as a key member of Prince founder Chen Zhi's "criminal gang".[11]

References

  1. Exclusive: World's 'largest online black market' loses banking license Radio Free Asia, retrieved 23 March 2025^
  2. Matt Burgess. The 'Largest Illicit Online Marketplace' Ever Is Growing at an Alarming Rate, Report Says Wired.com, retrieved 23 March 2025^
  3. Andy Greenberg. The $11 Billion Marketplace Enabling the Crypto Scam Economy Wired.com, retrieved 23 March 2025^
  4. Tom Wilson. Exclusive: North Korean hackers sent stolen crypto to wallet used by Asian payment firm Reuters, 15 July 2024^
  5. Huione Guarantee: The multi-billion dollar marketplace used by online scammers Elliptic, retrieved 9 July 2024^
  6. Selam Gebrekidan, Joy Dong. Takeaways from Our Money Laundering Investigation The New York Times, 23 March 2025, retrieved 23 March 2025^
  7. FinCEN Finds Cambodia-Based Huione Group to be of Primary Money Laundering Concern, Proposes a Rule to Combat Cyber Scams and Heists FinCEN website, retrieved 1 May 2025^
  8. Tom Wilson. US moves to ban Cambodia's Huione over alleged money laundering Reuters, 2 May 2025, retrieved 9 September 2025^
  9. Andy Greenberg. The Internet's Biggest-Ever Black Market Just Shut Down Amid a Telegram Purge 14 May 2025^
  10. Elliptic data leads to the shutdown of the two largest online criminal marketplaces of all time Elliptic, retrieved 14 May 2025^
  11. The Fall of a Cambodian Money-Laundering Giant nytimes.com, 1 April 2026, retrieved 7 April 2026^