Alexander Vinnik admin of BTC-e ? arrested in Greece for $ 4 billion in Bitcoin money laundering

Since yesterday evening, the social media have been battling new theories about the continuation of the BTC-e bitcoin market from Russia. Now Reuters and CNBC report that a Russian citizen was arrested in Greece. The accusation, from the American side, is money laundering of over 4 billion US dollars.

“Since 2011 the 38-year-old has been running a criminal organization which administers one of the most important websites of electronic crime in the world,” police said in a statement, describing an alleged money laundering operation that “legalizes proceeds from illegal activities”.

Greek police earlier said the suspect, who was picked up on a U.S. warrant, was thought to have used bitcoin to launder ‘at least’ $4 billion earned through illicit activities.

It was thought that ‘at least’ $4 billion in cash had been laundered through a bitcoin platform since 2011; the platform had 7 million bitcoins deposited, and 5.5 million bitcoins in withdrawals.

It is worrying, however, that BTC-e has also been in business since 2011. As a Russian Bitcoin exchange, one could also assume that the owner is also of Russian nationality. Meanwhile, the Russian Foreign Ministry reported that it had not heard of such an incident.

BTC-e is known since 2011 and is even part of the CoinDesk Bitcoin Price Index. Yesterday at 13:49 Moscow time the site went unplanned offline. A few minutes later, the official Twitter channel of the btc-e exchange said: “Work on an unforeseen problem.

Update: BTC-e hacked Mt Gox. Alexander Vinnik charged with numerous federal crimes by SF prosecutors – here is the indictment

source & image Reuters

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