Singapore Freezes $150M in Assets Linked to Alleged Bitcoin Fraud Kingpin Chen Zhi

Singapore police have frozen over S$150 million ($106 million) in assets connected to Chen Zhi, the Chinese-born chairman of Cambodia’s Prince Holding Group, as part of a sweeping international crackdown on crypto-related fraud.

The operation, conducted on October 30, targeted six properties, multiple bank and securities accounts, a yacht, 11 vehicles, and luxury items including alcohol collections, according to Caixin. Authorities confirmed that Chen and his associates are not currently in Singapore.

The seizure follows a coordinated global enforcement effort launched in mid-October, when U.S. and U.K. prosecutors filed criminal indictments against Chen and began proceedings to confiscate approximately $14.4 billion in Bitcoin. The asset pool, described by prosecutors as part of one of Asia’s most sophisticated transnational fraud operations, marks one of the largest digital asset seizures ever attempted.

**From Mining Mogul to Alleged Fraud Mastermind**

Chen established Prince Holding Group in 2015, initially presenting it as a real estate, finance, and hospitality conglomerate operating across more than 30 countries. However, U.S. prosecutors allege the company evolved into a criminal enterprise, accused of luring thousands of workers to Cambodia under false pretenses before forcing them to conduct large-scale “pig butchering” scams — long-term online frauds that trick victims into investing in fake crypto trading platforms.

Court filings indicate the network laundered proceeds through over 100 shell companies, using crypto exchanges and mining operations to obscure the origins of the funds before converting them to Bitcoin.

Between May 2021 and August 2022, investigators traced at least $18 million from over 250 U.S. victims through entities in Brooklyn and Queens, representing only a fraction of the billions funneled through Chen’s alleged global operation.

The U.S. Treasury’s Office of Foreign Assets Control (OFAC) sanctioned 146 individuals and entities tied to the Prince Group in October, while the Financial Crimes Enforcement Network (FinCEN) accused Cambodia-based Huione Group of laundering at least $4 billion in illicit funds.

Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent called the crackdown “a global response to a global crime,” noting that American victims alone suffered losses exceeding $16 billion.

Simultaneously, UK authorities issued parallel sanctions targeting Chen and several affiliates of the Prince Holding Group.

**Dormant Bitcoin Wallets Rekindle Suspicion**

Adding to the intrigue, a wallet linked to the Chinese mining pool LuBian—previously associated with Chen’s network—moved 11,886 BTC (worth $1.3 billion) just 24 hours after the U.S. Department of Justice’s announcement, following more than three years of inactivity.

A week later, another 15,959 BTC ($1.83 billion) was transferred to four separate addresses, raising speculation about defensive repositioning or internal restructuring of the remaining funds.

Data from Arkham Intelligence shows that 127,426 BTC (roughly $14.5 billion) was stolen from LuBian in December 2020, following an exploit in its private key generation system. The mining pool collapsed just two months later, with most of the stolen Bitcoin lying dormant until mid-2024.

LuBian, once promoted as “the safest high-yielding mining pool in the world,” had become the sixth-largest global pool before the 2020 attack wiped out more than 90% of its assets.

U.S. prosecutors allege Chen’s network used mining operations in Laos and elsewhere — including Warp Data and LuBian — to launder billions in crypto proceeds, producing “clean Bitcoin dissociated from criminal funds.”

If successful, the DOJ’s forfeiture efforts could add one of the largest single Bitcoin hauls in history to U.S. government holdings — which Treasury Secretary Bessent recently estimated at between $15 billion and $20 billion.