Stablecoins dominate illicit crypto activities, eclipsing Bitcoin
The era of the hooded hacker hoarding Bitcoin in a dark web wallet is over.
In 2025, the center of gravity in the illicit cryptocurrency economy shifted decisively away from the volatility of the original cryptocurrency and toward a dense, dollar-linked shadow system.
According to new Chainalysis data shared with CryptoSlate, stablecoins accounted for 84% of the $154 billion illicit transaction volume last year, marking a clear shift in risk toward programmable dollars.
This structural shift has enabled Chinese money laundering networks to scale “laundering-as-a-service” operations while nation-states like North Korea, Russia, and Iran plugged into these same rails to evade Western controls.
Why criminals ditched Bitcoin
The most…
