Everybody Loves Our Dollars - How Money Laundering Won

From the bestselling author of Butler to the World , Drugs for Gucci reveals how organised criminals move vast amounts of dirty money around the globe, how they escape the eyes of law enforcement and how they turn their ill-gotten income into vast amounts of legitimately recognised wealth. Without the existence of money laundering, few crimes of acquisition would be worth the effort required to commit them. But despite decades of effort expended on stamping it out, money laundering is more ubiquitous than ever, with organised criminals coming up with ever more innovative and efficient ways to clean their cash. With forensic precision, Oliver Bullough pulls back the curtain on this shadow financial system and joins together the dots of a sophisticated international operation that connects illegal logging in Papua New Guinea, real estate purchases in Vancouver, terrorism in the Middle East and capital flight from China. Drawing on complex court records and first-hand accounts from convicted money launderers, prosecutors and serious fraud officers, Bullough reveals that there may, in fact, be a way to stop crime from paying - if only we are prepared to enter the tunnel at the heart of the global economy and see where it leads . . .

From the bestselling author of Butler to the World , Drugs for Gucci reveals how organised criminals move vast amounts of dirty money around the globe, how they escape the eyes of law enforcement and how they turn their ill-gotten income into vast amounts of legitimately recognised wealth. Without the existence of money laundering, few crimes of acquisition would be worth the effort required to commit them. But despite decades of effort expended on stamping it out, money laundering is more ubiquitous than ever, with organised criminals coming up with ever more innovative and efficient ways to clean their cash. With forensic precision, Oliver Bullough pulls back the curtain on this shadow financial system and joins together the dots of a sophisticated international operation that connects illegal logging in Papua New Guinea, real estate purchases in Vancouver, terrorism in the Middle East and capital flight from China. Drawing on complex court records and first-hand accounts from convicted money launderers, prosecutors and serious fraud officers, Bullough reveals that there may, in fact, be a way to stop crime from paying - if only we are prepared to enter the tunnel at the heart of the global economy and see where it leads . . .

From the bestselling author of MONEYLAND and BUTLER TO THE WORLD, a revelatory new anatomy of global money laundering, the crime that makes crime pay Without money laundering, few crimes of acquisition would be worth the trouble. South America's drug cartels would be stuffed without it, as would Nigerian kleptocrats, Afghan terrorists, American tax evaders and a whole bestiary of human (and animal) traffickers the world over. And yet, estimates of the dirty portion of world GDP have held steady at 2%-5% for decades. All efforts at legislation, diplomacy, prosecution and compliance have been a complete flop. It's not a lack of will to stamp it out. It's a lack of insight. So join bestselling investigative journalist Oliver Bullough on a perspective-altering adventure through the flipside of the global economy. In the criminal world, cash is still king (in fact, crime might now be the main thing cash is good for, and even why it still exists). Barter is pretty good too: vast, continent-wide exchanges of everything from luxury handbags to baby eels support a triangular drug trade linking Europe to the Far East. Cryptocurrencies flow through paper ledgers that would make a Florentine merchant feel at home. And the system works. Whether you're a fraudster, a cartel boss, a corrupt politician, a kleptocrat or a terrorist mastermind, your options to move and hide your money are more secure and more impenetrable than they have ever been. There has never been a better time to be a criminal. It's time that changed.

From the bestselling author of MONEYLAND and BUTLER TO THE WORLD, a revelatory new anatomy of global money laundering, the crime that makes crime pay Without money laundering, few crimes of acquisition would be worth the trouble. South America's drug cartels would be stuffed without it, as would Nigerian kleptocrats, Afghan terrorists, American tax evaders and a whole bestiary of human (and animal) traffickers the world over. And yet, estimates of the dirty portion of world GDP have held steady at 2%-5% for decades. All efforts at legislation, diplomacy, prosecution and compliance have been a complete flop. It's not a lack of will to stamp it out. It's a lack of insight. So join bestselling investigative journalist Oliver Bullough on a perspective-altering adventure through the flipside of the global economy. In the criminal world, cash is still king (in fact, crime might now be the main thing cash is good for, and even why it still exists). Barter is pretty good too: vast, continent-wide exchanges of everything from luxury handbags to baby eels support a triangular drug trade linking Europe to the Far East. Cryptocurrencies flow through paper ledgers that would make a Florentine merchant feel at home. And the system works. Whether you're a fraudster, a cartel boss, a corrupt politician, a kleptocrat or a terrorist mastermind, your options to move and hide your money are more secure and more impenetrable than they have ever been. There has never been a better time to be a criminal. It's time that changed.