Internet Payment Processor Liberty Reserve Accused of Laundering $6 Billion

pdclarry writes with a followup to this weekend's story that Liberty Reserve, a huge international payment processor, had been shut down and its founder had been arrested. "Liberty Reserve, apparently the Internet bank of choice for criminals, as reported by the NY Times, Wired and Business Week, has been accused of laundering over $6 billion dollars. Incorporated in Costa Rica in 2006, Liberty Reserve allegedly 'facilitated global criminal conduct' and was created and structured 'as a criminal business venture, one designed to help criminals conduct illegal transactions and launder the proceeds of their crimes,' Manhattan U.S. Attorney Preet Bharara said in an indictment (PDF) unsealed today. Chatter on criminal web sites show a rising sense of panic as fortunes have disappeared in an instant."

Comments

as opposed to the 300 trillion

[maliqua]

that HSBC may have laundered..

Re:as opposed to the 300 trillion

[thesupraman]

I believe its called 'too big to fail'
Also known as 'the people in power keep their money there'

Re:as opposed to the 300 trillion

[anagama]

Came here to make an HSBC quip.

Although Matt Taibi has it at 10 Billion, his description of the settlement with HSBC is sadly hilarious:

Wow. So the executives who spent a decade laundering billions of dollars will have to partially defer their bonuses during the five-year deferred prosecution agreement? Are you fucking kidding me? That's the punishment? The government's negotiators couldn't hold firm on forcing HSBC officials to completely wait to receive their ill-gotten bonuses? They had to settle on making them "partially" wait? Every honest prosecutor in America has to be puking his guts out at such bargaining tactics. What was the Justice Department's opening offer -- asking executives to restrict their Caribbean vacation time to nine weeks a year?

http://www.rollingstone.com/politics/blogs/taibblog/outrageous-hsbc-settlement-proves-the-drug-war-is-a-joke-20121213

Anyway, one thing is clear. Liberty Reserve didn't donate enough to Obama's campaign to get a slap on the wrist and and a cabinet post.

karma truck

[magarity]

"a rising sense of panic as fortunes have disappeared in an instant"

So now they know how their victims feel?

What is 300 trillion ?

[Taco Cowboy]

Liberty Reserve may have laundered 6 Billion, HSBC may have laundered 300 trillion, but all in all, what does that all mean ?

How come governments can "create" new money out of thin air, trillions at a time, and it's all legal, but when Joe-on-the-street did some side jobs and made some money out of it and does not want it to be taxed, they call it "money laundering" ?

It's all about control, it's all about TPTB exerting their control over us

It's a case of the Great Leader can do everything they want to (even to the point of supplying weapons to some groups of seedy people to fight/kill/murder other groups of seedy people) but you, the Joe-on-the-street, don't get to do anything you want because you just ain't nobody

Re: What is 300 trillion ?

[Xeranar]

Idiots who don't understand fiat currency make me sad. Basically we dillute the money supply as a proportion of the GDP. In other words we base our money off of our collective labor rather than some arbitrary metal we deem rare enough to care about.

Re: What is 300 trillion ?

[Arker]

You must make yourself very sad.

"We" dont do any of this. A cabal of the best connected and wealthiest bankers in the country do it, in private, as they see fit, and we get no say. When they inflate the currency, they dont create new value - they just suck some of the value out of the old currency. And then they get to spend the new currency. Great scam. Of course they try to restrain their greed enough to keep the inflation at a level where the increase in GDP can mask it - they dont want to be set on with torches and pitchforks any more than anyone else does.

Re: What is 300 trillion ?

[ShanghaiBill]

That's the kind of insanity that's driving the US deeper into the hole. Doubling down on failed policies won't turn the economy around, and such failed policies haven't even worked as advertised for the last several years.

The opposite of what America is doing is called "austerity". That is what Europe is doing. Two years ago we both had near 10% unemployment. Today, America is at 8% and Europe is at 12%. In the face of this reality, I think you look pretty foolish arguing that America's monetary expansion is wrong and we should be more like Europe. It is important to balance budgets and pay down debts, but trying to do it in the middle of a recession is nuts.